


Emergence

by Tasogareban



Category: Reylo - Fandom
Genre: Angst and Fluff and Smut, Eventual Smut, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Gratuitous Smut, Heavy Angst, Shameless Smut, Smut, So much smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-10
Updated: 2016-04-01
Packaged: 2018-05-25 23:34:14
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 39,079
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6214588
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tasogareban/pseuds/Tasogareban
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>His voice came feverishly, deep with his need for her and she found herself set aflame, desirable yet again. Beautiful. He wanted her, craved her as much as she now did him. But he was coming apart at the seams and the early stages of his exquisite shattering were beginning to reverberate throughout the First Order like an earthquake. His tremors were palpable from where she resided and she felt almost proud that she could bring a man to his knees with hunger for her.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter One

Chapter One:

 

The first time she visited him, it was not deliberate.

  
Her training had been progressing at a snail’s pace for nearly half a year but the things that she had learned had not prepared her to flock immediately to him. She had expected to learn the ways of the lightsaber, the significant things involved with the Force. But Luke Skywalker was nothing if not thorough. He had started off slow with her, almost tentatively in his training of her and they had progressed gradually. It had taken years, he had said, to train young padawans. And now she was his and she would be learning at an unbearably slow pace. Perhaps this was why there had been an academy, schooling.

  
This would not be a crash course, it seemed.

  
They had divided their time between the new Resistance base since D’Qar had been compromised, and Ahch-To, training in both territories regardless of location. Bringing Luke to leave the first Jedi temple had been easier than Rey had expected and she supposed it was because he had finally taken her on as his charge and understood her duties and allegiance now to the Resistance.

  
But one evening he had sat her down in the middle of her quarters on the base and had asked her to open her mind, to allow her thoughts to travel where they would, to allow them free reign. She believed he wanted to know where her mind would flock to, wanted to see what she held deep within herself. And she had allowed herself to roam liberally, to soar and then converge on one simple thought.

  
She had thought of darkness, had questioned why the pull was so strong for some. Why it was so strong for one person in particular. What had happened to turn him to the Dark side.

  
And then she had come face to face with him.

  
Or rather, face to mask. Even though everything had felt dreamlike and surreal, she’d been unable to suppress the horror that had streaked through her as she had opened her eyes and found herself standing in a brightly lit metallic hallway, directly in his path. Almost floating, she had attempted to scramble backward, away. But he had been stalking down the cold corridor, flanked by a small group of storm troopers and she had not been able to scurry out of the way fast enough.

  
He had passed right through her, an icy wind that had dragged a pained gasp out of her and had frozen her lungs solid. She was a ghost, only there in mind not body, but every part of her was suddenly on fire, so cold that she burned.

  
As he had phased through her, there had been an abrupt hitch in his step. She hadn’t realized it for she had been stricken into stillness, her mental body somehow rigid, unable to inhale. A shuffle behind her had dimly alerted her to the fact that he had slowed, that he had sensed…something.

  
Her.

  
No. It wasn’t possible. She should have been invisible and intangible. He wasn’t supposed to know she was there at all.

  
And as she had finally managed to turn, slowly and shakily, he had continued down the corridor, a black shadow in tatters in a brightly lit hallway.

  
She had vanished away, a ghost on a breath of wind, watching him walk away and she had been relieved. 

* * *

Preview:

A shield. He had used her as a shield, she thought dimly, before she suddenly couldn’t think at all.


	2. Chapter Two

Chapter Two:

 

            When she visited him again, she did it willingly. Her first venture had been an accident. This time she was purposefully going to see him. She wanted to watch him unseen, spy on him and ascertain his whereabouts. He could prove to be instrumental in the Resistance’s efforts to strike at the First Order and what better way than through one of their most loyal and formidable knights?

            Luke had been hesitant when she had spoken to him of her idea. There was something he had seemed he had wanted to say and his questions had instead focused on Kylo Ren; had it been easy to travel to him? Why had she thought of him in her first attempt to open her mind to the Force? Had she gone to him or had she been called? Had the Master of the Knights of Ren expected her?

            Did she feel close to him? As if they shared…a bond, perhaps?

            She hadn’t spoken about it again after answering his questions in confusion. But she had not given up on her plan.

 

            That second time, she had envisioned the same scenario as the first; darkness, white stormtrooper guard, and the man clothed in blackness behind the metallic face.

            As such, when she appeared she immediately took a step back at finding herself in the middle of another long, bright corridor. The pounding of synchronized footsteps reached her ears from behind, echoing eerily. She turned slowly, feeling light and almost ethereal, and she found herself in their midst.

            This time he was flanked by only two stormtroopers. She realized later that they had not been following him so much as making their rounds for he had been several yards ahead of them when she had come into being in that hallway.

            And this time he slowed quite noticeably, his head of black metal turning back toward her as he passed her figure. She turned as well, following him with widening eyes. There was no way he could see her; she was incorporeal, an apparition in his midst, but he was still startling upon first sight.

            It also seemed that appearing invisibly was not the case this time for he came to a stiff halt before her, his shoulders hitched up in what she could only assume was uncertainty.

            He must sense her, she thought wildly, her face blanching. He stood a slight distance from her, a tall shadow cloaked in tatters and bindings. His hood rested down on his back, revealing the sleek curves and battered surfaces of his black helm.

            The animosity coiling off his figure caused her to move reflexively for the weapon at her hip, the lightsaber hilt that she rarely wore now for Luke did not have her practicing with it quite yet.

            At her gesture, the Knight’s head snapped down to her fumbling fingers and his own gloved hand darted to his side. Unlike her, he did have his weapon on his person and she slapped at her side futilely, panicking. She hadn’t thought she would need it, hadn’t even thought she would be _visible_ -

            Kylo Ren’s attention was suddenly diverted to her right, his head turning further as he seemed to look past her.

            She hadn’t been aware of the commotion that had risen in the corridor but as an unexpected shiver raced down her spine, she found herself spinning almost fearfully to see what had captured the Knight’s attention behind her. It had to be something bigger than her, something more imposing, wholly more dangerous, to distract him from an enemy in his own house.

            The pair of stormtroopers had their weapons raised and in that moment she realized that she was not only visible to Kylo Ren but to absolutely everyone in the corridor.

            A low warning sound came from the man dressed in darkness at her back but she didn’t have a chance to look at him again. The stormtroopers had their weapons in their hands and had already fired.

            Even as she flinched away she caught a glimpse of darkness, of an arm clothed in black bindings and a glove, lifting and curling around her shoulder to flare open outward directly in front of her chest. She felt the sudden heat of the Knight at her back, felt the hard muscle curved around the side of her arm and for a moment she was too startled to move. She was suddenly fighting a battle on two fronts, a threat that had effectively managed to flank her on both sides and trap her in the middle.

            But then she saw the sudden halt of a beam of blue light in mid-flight before her, hanging between her figure and the weapon that had fired it, from one storm trooper in the corridor. The other flash, however, was a mere brilliant streak before she felt an immense impact across her breast. Her breath was ripped from her and she was thrust backward into the Knight’s solid form before she ricocheted off him and down to the cold metallic floor, crashing violently.

            A shield. He had used her as a shield, she thought dimly, before she suddenly couldn’t think at all.

            The other beam flew a moment later, her vision blurring as the Knight of Ren released his Force hold on it. He dragged his arm in across his hidden face and darted to the side, barely avoiding the blast as it slipped by and struck a far wall. A moment later he had recovered, rising to his full height, a tidal wave of fury and darkness pouring out of him as if through a fissure in a dam. His arm swiped the air again in a manic gesture, the ragged coattails flying. There was the sound of a hard impact, a cry ringing throughout the corridor as the Knight gestured silently once more, one last heated wave. Then there was only stillness in the corridor save for her gasps.

            He was moving a moment later, sweeping in close to her side.

            She couldn’t breathe. Whatever had struck her in the chest still seemed to rest there like a lump, stealing her air and replacing it with pressure. As the lean figure moved overhead, she felt herself seize and she didn’t know whether it was from fear or pain. But when the Knight came down to kneel over her, the metal was gone from his head and a pale face with black waves of hair had replaced it.

            His expression was tight as he leaned over her, his black eyes dropping to her chest before flying back to meet her frightened gaze. A long scarred line adorned his face, streaking from his brow down toward his jaw, a slight welt now.

            She wanted to touch it, dizzy from lack of air and sense. But she couldn’t get a breath in, her lungs feeling as if they were filled with something thick and hot. She wheezed, heaving as she stared up at him. “I…I-“

            “Be quiet,” he ordered her curtly. His gloved hand came down and circled her neck, causing her to flinch in between gasps.

            No. _No._ She was not going to die here, not like this-

            But he was merely lifting her from the floor, his fingers cradling her head and bringing her close. “Listen to me,” he stated carefully, brooking no argument. His voice was deep, she remembered that voice, and his words were rapid. “You need to wake up.”

            She stared at him in breathless confusion for a moment, her light eyes blinking back involuntary tears.

            “What you are feeling is in your head,” he continued, nodding slowly and emphatically as he spoke. His gestures made her want to nod her head as well, as if she could understand anything he said at the moment. He was still speaking though, that deep tone that was almost intense if not for how harshly he spoke. “You are not physically here. You are in a meditative state somewhere and now you need to wake up from it.”

            She blinked again, barely hearing him. He was right; she vaguely remembered seating herself on the ground in the middle of a clearing, surrounded by lush trees, the cloudy sky above. It would rain soon, she had thought dimly. She nodded with him, in two places at once, and for a moment the darkness beckoned and her eyes slipped closed.

            _“Rey!”_

            Her name from his mouth was foreign, strange. How did he even know it? The thought served to revive her again with its ensuing confusion.

            His brow was drawn low and there was a curiously bright anger in his eyes. “Listen to my words!” he shouted at her and he shook her, a finger digging into the back of her head and rousing her almost to full alertness. “You are not here! You are in meditation! Do you hear me?”

            When she didn’t respond, her lips trembling almost as hard as her body, he dropped his dark eyes to her mouth as if attempting to read her words from them.

            Seeming to realize that she couldn’t respond, his voice lowered and it was somehow a soothing tone, speaking words that were familiar but at the same time unnerving coming from him. She felt a painful longing beneath the immense pressure in her chest and her eyes slid shut in relief, tears sliding free and rolling down the sides of her face as she listened to him murmur the Code that should’ve been long forgotten to him.

            “…there is no chaos. There is harmony.”

            She nodded again, wordlessly this time, her eyes fluttering as she dropped them to his lips. It was a struggle just to keep them open but she found herself mouthing the following words with him, quaking in his arms, feeling his strength and latching onto it for all she was worth.

            “There is no death. There is the Force.”

            He leaned over her as they spoke the Code together, his words soft, hers silent, his grip on her head reassuring.

            “Now wake up,” he ordered in a hiss.

 

            And she was suddenly doing just that, her eyes snapping open to see green trees around her, feeling the cold breeze and the beginning drops of rain upon her face. She quickly inhaled harshly, feeling as if she hadn’t taken a breath in years, and the pressure lifted away from her chest, leaving her taking in huge gulps of air.

            Scrambling backward onto her rear, she smacked at her breast, at the spot where she had been hit by the blaster beam. Frantically, she dropped her head and yanked at the material of her top to peer down at the skin below.

            A sore red stain marked her chest, just above the bands binding her breasts and she immediately saw that it would purple and bruise before long. But she was alive, with the wind on her face and the raindrops on her skin.

            And he had saved her life.

 

            Kylo Ren sat back on his haunches, his hands now empty. He lifted his head, turning to look over his shoulder to the two stormtroopers strewn across the floor of the bright corridor and he said nothing, merely exhaling.

 

**Preview:**

But she realized in that moment that she couldn’t help herself; there was something about him that was inexorably drawing her back to him time and again and she wasn’t sure she appreciated the feeling.

 


	3. Chapter Three

Chapter Three:

 

            When she visited him again, it was very late in the evening where he resided. She didn’t welcome nightfall as much as others did. She much preferred the day, the sunlight, even though on Jakku the sun and the heat had constantly taken a toll on her. Appearing in his bedroom in the night left her feeling as if she had stepped into his domain and the eerie shivers would not leave her as she materialized into the darkness of his quarters.

            But she realized in that moment that she couldn’t help herself; there was something about him that was inexorably drawing her back to him time and again and she wasn’t sure she appreciated the feeling.

            She hadn’t exactly told Luke what had happened the last time she had gone to see the Knight. She had merely asked if a Force user could die when they mind-walked, if they could feel pain and be physically hurt. He had stared at her for a long moment, his silence telling, his eyes conveying even more. He had begun to speak the words of the Code just as Kylo Ren had, and she’d remembered then how the Master of the Knights of Ren would have known the Jedi Code. Of course he would have known it even if he didn’t believe in it anymore; she stood before the very man that had trained him so many years before.

            She had stopped Luke before he had hit the end. “Just _tell_ me. Tell me if a physical death is possible in that state.”

            His jaw had shifted before he had responded. “Yes.”

            Now, in the middle of his night, Kylo Ren stood before a large wall of transparisteel, looking out into the world beyond. He wore his dark uniform, the hood resting low along his shoulders, his hands clasped behind his back. His helmet sat on a side table next to a low bed in the middle of the darkened room, facing her, and the small glimpse of it sent icy tremors racing through her.

            She had stood there only for a few moments before he turned and looked at her over his shoulder. She blinked, suddenly afraid that he knew she was there, that he could sense her, _see_ her, the way he had the last time.

            His expression was severe in the soft moonlight, dark waves hiding half of his long, pale face. He met her eyes, stared deep into her, almost to her soul. And as she blinked, he seemed to appreciate what he saw then. “Of course I know you’re there,” he said to her and he arched a brow, his voice deep and jarring. “You’re visible now.”

            His words didn’t register to her for she was suddenly remembering that voice, his cadence, from when he had stood beside her in a brightly lit interrogation room, his dark gaze having run freely across her trapped form. He had told her that he could take anything he had wanted from her arrogantly and a part of her had thrilled at his words though the rest of her had frozen in fear that he would steal her secrets right out of her head.

            He chuckled faintly and turned to look back out his window. “There is darkness in you yet,” he murmured absentmindedly, staring out across the cold landscape of the world.

            Anger rose in her then; anger that he could see her and that he could rip her thoughts, her very emotions, from her. After she had taken such measures to project herself across vast distances, struggling to appear incorporeally; being insulted and taunted was the last straw. Her brilliant plan to shadow him invisibly had backfired the second she had lost the ability to appear undetectably and her temper snapped with the realization. “Stop it,” she hissed at his back.

            Her sudden resentment brought him to look at her once more and there was far more interest in his eyes then, his form almost vibrating eagerly. “You came to _me_ , scavenger,” he stated carelessly. “If you don’t like the things I can do perhaps you should see your way home.” He tilted his face as he spoke and the waves fell away from his face to betray the long thin line from his brow down to the outside corner of his lip. “Before you begin to prefer it, that is.”

            She barely heard his words, her lips slowly parting at his disfigurement. She had put that scar there on his face with the swing of a borrowed lightsaber, one that she was now allowed to wield and was properly hers. She had stared at the scar when she had been struck down in the bright hallway by the stormtroopers, had wanted to lift a hand to trail a finger along the cleanly healed slice.

            “Admiring your work?” he asked when she continued to stand in stunned silence. He turned his face away again, effectively snapping her out of her haze, and he lifted it to the moonlit land and trees outside the confines of his quarters. His nose was prominent but his profile was beautiful, his face soft. It was not a side of him that she was used to and not a side of herself that she appreciated then.

            He was a murderer. It would serve her well to remember that.

            “I admired it as well the entire time I mended,” he continued idly, his jaw shifting. “So much time wasted in a tank of bacta but so much time to think.”

            He spoke the words as if he hadn’t given them thought. She had heard the same tone when he had ripped her thoughts of his now-deceased father from her head.

            _“Han Solo. You feel like he’s the father you never had.”_ The slight pause, the brisk words. “ _He would have disappointed you._ ”

            He arched a brow, swiftly inhaling deeply. “You are alive at the very least,” he murmured and she suddenly realized that she owed him a debt even if she didn’t clearly understand how he had helped her. But he was moving on, thoughts seemingly flitting about restlessly though he held himself still and remote. “Why are you here then?” he asked. “Not to repay it, obviously.”

            With those words she understood that he had lifted her previous thoughts directly from her. He didn’t turn to face her as he spoke, instead focusing his attention to the dark wood outside the window.

            Wherever he was, whether on a ship or on the second coming of StarKiller Base, the forest outside held no snow along its canopy and the world was dark and silent in stillness. “I don’t…know-“ she replied distractedly, attempting to discern their location from the glimpses she was afforded. Even if her original plan had failed, it didn’t mean she couldn’t still-

            He snapped his head around toward her, causing her attention to dart back to him. His black eyes glittered in the night as they came to rest on her. “Lies do not become a Jedi,” he hissed at her through clenched teeth and his anger suddenly billowed out of him into the room like an invisible cloud. His mercurial change brought an icy shiver to streak down her spine and she watched as he swiftly became bigger in his quarters, somehow growing in darkness. His hands dropped away from each other, tensing into fists at his sides and a moment later he was stalking toward her.

            She immediately staggered away, reaching to her side for a lightsaber hilt that was not present in her astral walk. As he converged on her she tripped backward, and they shifted across the room until her back rammed into a hard wall. Only then did he stop and even still, he loomed over her, a large silhouette against the moonlight trailing in through the far window. He was tall, almost unbearably so, his height and breadth of shoulders threatening to overpower her by size alone. She felt his darkness, trembled in its coldness, but as she did so he was squinting at her at the same time, breathing heavily.

            _So dark,_ she thought wildly, panicking.

            “Your light,” he rasped and he recoiled from her, his lips narrowing into a bloodless line as he threw up a hand.

            She found a moment later that she could not move. She was suddenly frozen, her head arched upward, body pressed to the wall at her back. She grimaced, eyes darting to the side as she tested the grip of the Force, pulling. Her efforts brought a tightening to his jaw and he slowly neared once more, his hand drawing in close to his chest with the movement.

            “You can’t escape now, can you,” he said quietly, his eyes narrowing. “You’ve trapped yourself in your own dream, barely strong enough to project yourself much less defend yourself.”

            His words caused her to shift her eyes to him, her head held steadfast by his power. A dream, he had said. Was this a dream? No, this was an astral projection, the same thing she had done from the start except that she had somehow become visible between then and now. He had said as much moments before. But she was wide awake back home, only in meditation. She hadn’t known that she would be visible again this time around, corporeal. Something he could seize and trap.

            “You’re right,” she whispered to him and he tilted his head at her words, dark brows furrowing. “It’s too much to project myself. So let me stop.”

            And with her words, her eyes came open and she was seated on the floor of her bedroom quarters in the new Resistance Base once more, inhaling deeply and snapping fully awake.

 

            In the darkened room aboard the ship, the Knight felt his hold collapse as she vanished from his grip. He dropped his hand to his side, fingers curling in tightly. But the small smile that lifted his mouth was not disappointed. “Now you’re learning,” he murmured to the empty room.

**Preview:**

She stumbled in mid-flight and the mistake brought her down to a knee roughly. He was upon her in an instant, his lightsaber deflecting hers as she threw it up frantically to defend herself. His weapon shoved her blue blade aside and wedged it into the ground at their side, stabbing it in deep and holding it there under his own saber. And then his free arm lashed out, his hand taking hold of her by the chin roughly and he brought her face up to lock eyes with his.

 


	4. Chapter Four

Chapter Four:

 

            The next time she laid eyes on him, it was no dream and it was no visitation. She had hitched a ride with Poe and a small crew to Takodana to scavenge through the remnants of what remained of Maz’s castle. Maz herself had abandoned her post and though she had vanished without leaving a destination with anyone, she had peered closely into Rey’s eyes before she had left and had told her that they would meet again.

            With the ruins and the debris all around, Rey found herself a bit adrift. There had been so much here to be discovered, memories to unearth, secrets to be unveiled, and she had run from it. There was nothing to be found now except ashes and a deep well of anger directed at herself. She had been here with Han Solo, had helped pilot the Millennium Falcon to this place and even now she felt a deep pain that he was no longer here with her, helping her, condescending to her good-naturedly the way an unwilling mentor would have. The way he _should_ have.

            There had been so much ahead of her and the mere thought of it threatened to twist her into tears. She had almost had a family, people to guide her in this new part of her life.

            Now what did she have? Confusion and a path that she was still uncertain about to the very day.

            “I need to make some adjustments to the Explorer. The trip was a bit clunky, did you feel it?” Poe asked behind her and she snapped awake, turning to face him.

            “I did,” she replied, quickly recovering. “Do you need help?”

            A smile quirked the pilot’s mouth. “Nah. You do what you have to do. It shouldn’t take me long. I’m going to send the crew out, have them pick through this mess and see what we can bring back to the general.”

            Rey merely nodded. Casting a long look over the destruction of the castle, her eyes instead drifted toward the expanse of trees, the route she had taken when she had encountered a certain Master of the Knights of Ren. Squinting slightly, she looked at Poe again. “I need to do something. I don’t think it will take long. Is that all right?”       

            The cheer faltered on Poe’s face slightly. “Yeah, sure. Everything okay?”

            She nodded again, hoping to maintain a blank expression. “Yes. I will remain in communication with you. I just…need a moment.”

            Poe stared at her for a long moment. “Okay. Be careful. And call for me if you need anything. I’ll be right here.”

            With a smile that was gone as quickly as it had appeared, Rey turned and began to climb across the debris, heading toward the forest.

 

            Curving through the trees, she tried to remember the path she had taken, the winds in a makeshift road. She narrowed her eyes, brushing back slight tendrils of hair as she spun slowly. Close. She was very close. Her eyes caught on a specific tangle of rock and fallen branch and she felt herself go cold, instinctive. There. Her legs suddenly began to carry her forward and she followed almost helplessly, knowing then where she was going and unable to stop herself.

            But at the moment, she didn’t want to stop herself. She wanted to see. She _needed_ to see. And she needed to remember, clearly this time. Not flashes of rock and green; she needed to remember every moment of their encounter, every sensation that she had felt when he had appeared. She needed it more in that moment than she had ever needed anything; more than the breath in her lungs and she already knew what it was to need air.

            A soft and familiar noise came to life under the sudden roar of her heart but she couldn’t focus on that, not now, not yet.

            Her previous path led down to a crevice of rock and stone, of falling dirt, tangled branches and moss and she had a flash, understood what the rock felt like under her palm. She reached a hand out still, fingers touching upon the surface and she frowned at it, wanting to remember, wanting to see clearly.

            And then came another type of sound, one all too familiar and jarring.

            The ice that flashed down her spine was almost painful, seizing her by the neck and causing her to stiffen in place. The sound came again, the hollow metallic fan of a sound, of something cutting through the air and resonating. Her breath suddenly came faster, unstoppable, coming at a full pant as she turned her head through immense effort, afraid to look.

            Why had she _done_ this?

            The creature that came around that bend of rock held the untamed red lightsaber in his gloved hand and she felt something inside her recoil in terror. She had no blaster in her possession this time and even if she had, she still would have reacted the same way because he was monstrous, inhuman.

            Without another look, she turned and ran.

            As she bolted she realized what the initial familiar sound had been. Poe’s voice was coming through her comlink shrilly, shouting. He must’ve known _he_ was here, must have seen the Knight’s shuttle land. She had been so transfixed by her surroundings, by the need to know, that she had blocked out everything else. Her long legs carried her over fallen branches and logs, through the soil and slippery rock as she ran and she was suddenly furious with herself.

            Had she known? Deep down, had she known he would be here, that he would come here today? More so, had _he_ known that he would find her here today? Had she given it away in that _bond_ that Luke believed they somehow shared?

            Something tangled in her feet and she went sprawling. Her hands barely caught her but she still slid, dirt flying, her comlink soaring from her belt where she had strapped it. Lunging quickly across the ground, she looked toward the device where it rested. Too far. She debated reaching for it with the Force but at this point she could barely levitate a rock much less drag the comlink to her quickly. She looked over her shoulder and he was suddenly too near, hovering just over her. She immediately scrambled away, all dragging fingers and adrenaline, and the Knight cocked his hooded head at her.

            “Has he taught you nothing?” he asked her quietly, his deep voice metallic and emotionless through the mask.

            When she didn’t respond, he snapped his head to the side, reaching out with flared fingers. The comlink wavered across the ground and then flew into the air, directly into his palm like a rocket.

            Rey stared over her shoulder, her chest heaving fearfully.

            The Knight turned to look down at her again, dropping his hand at his side as he crushed the comlink in his grip. Poe’s voice instantly died away, broken into silence. The pieces of the comlink fell from Kylo Ren’s fingers, littering the ground before her and she watched them fall before lifting her gaze back to the mask.

            “You would reject my proposal to teach you and for what?” The Knight’s shoulders lifted as he inhaled deeply, the mask turning up toward the sky peeking through the canopy of trees overhead. “To be taught by an old man who has long since forgotten how to use the Force properly, who believes in feeling _nothing_.”

            Rey turned very slowly onto her back, her legs shifting. She managed to draw away from the tall, dark figure slightly but as his hand tightened on the red lightsaber at his side, she stopped trying to distance herself from him. “I would learn from him before I would ever put my training in your hands,” she whispered to him harshly, her jaw clenching.

            A small sound issued from behind the mask, one she recognized as a mirthless snort. “Of course. Such a brilliant light could never be conquered,” he said with what resembled a sigh. “But…it can be tarnished.”

            She frowned at him, her lips parting slightly.

            With a slight shake of his head, the Knight shifted his saber before backing away a step. “Then let us begin.”

            Rey’s frown persisted. “Begin what?” she questioned.

            He didn’t reply to that verbally. Turning away from her with what could only have been a flaunting gesture of floating coattails, he instead waved his free hand.

            Something at Rey’s side shifted and then trembled. Startled, Rey’s hand flew to her belt and encountered the hilt of the lightsaber. She reflexively snared it down against her hip to hold it to her side but a moment later she realized that he hadn’t attempted to grasp the saber so much as the belt it sat strapped into.

            They had fought before on a snowy battlefield to acquire the lightsaber she currently owned and he had failed where she had succeeded. He could not physically possess the saber or call it to his person. Instead he had gone for the belt and this time he had succeeded.

            In frightening her.

            With another soft chuckle through his mask, Kylo Ren dropped his hand back to his side and strode a few steps before turning to face her once more.

            He wanted a duel.

            “Why don’t you just kill me?” she asked him through gritted teeth from the ground. When he didn’t answer, she scrambled to her feet. A part of her wanted to wipe the dirt from her rear, a stupid useless gesture but one she realized she wanted to do to orient herself, to compose herself before him. Anything to not seem so unprepared. “It’s what you want, isn’t it? Besides offering to train me? Something that I will never allow you to do, just so you know.”

            “Kill you?” he asked her and he cocked that helmeted head again. Deactivating the red lightsaber, he hitched it on his belt, causing Rey to watch him warily. The gloved hands came up to the helmet, taking hold of it, thumbs reaching to press on the release.

            “Keep it on,” she ordered him and he paused in the motion. She had no idea where the gall came from, only that she knew what she felt. Her hand flew back to the lightsaber hilt at her waist and tightened around it. “I wish to fight the faceless monster I see before me.”

            He sighed again under the mask and proceeded to remove it nonetheless. The helmet released with a soft hiss and then he was lifting it from his head to reveal the long, cold face beneath. “Are we to have this same conversation again?” he asked her, no longer muffled and metallic under the helmet. “It is redundant.”

            It was easier when he had kept the helmet on, she thought with a sinking feeling. At least then she would not have felt anything engaging him in combat. Now with a face behind that darkness, he was again a person, one who was infinitely dangerous and somehow alluring.

            His dark eyes lifted to hers and the corner of his mouth quirked faintly. “It makes it harder, does it?” he asked her slowly, almost seductively. “To see me as _him_ rather than to see me as Kylo Ren?”

            She knew whom he meant with his words. “Kylo Ren doesn’t exist,” she said to him and her face turned hard even as she felt an ache deep inside. Her voice came strained, her sentence broken. “But neither does Ben Solo anymore.”

            If she hadn’t been staring so painfully at him, she would have missed the slight shift in his expression. But it was gone within the moment and he turned his face away as he dropped the helmet to the ground beside his feet. As it fell with a hard thump, he merely replied, “You’re absolutely right.”

            And then his hand was lifting to the lightsaber at his waist again. He unhooked it and took it into his palm, facing her once more and now there was nothing on his face except stillness. Blankness.

            The sinking feeling returned to her and she quickly scrambled for something to hold off this battle, to talk him out of it. “You won’t kill me,” she said to him rapidly.

            The lightsaber came to jolting life in his palm, the reverberating sound cutting through the stillness, and he merely looked at her silently as if daring her to give him a good reason as to why.

            The red glow lit his face and she was suddenly taken back to StarKiller, to the murder of his father on that lonely bridge. She swallowed through a hard lump, her eyes dropping to the lightsaber before flying back to his expressionless face. “You saved me once. You knew if I had stayed in that corridor, in your _arms_ -“

            His eyes narrowed.

            “So long as I stayed there that I would have _died_ there. And you showed me the way back.” She shook her head, fingers tightening on the hilt of her saber again even as she spoke. “You didn’t want me dead then and you don’t want me dead now. You want to teach me, to train me. But you don’t want to see me dead.”

            He gave her a slow blink, seemed to mull her words over. And then he inhaled deeply, his chest lifting and suddenly he was all the more imposing. He had a tall, lean frame but with the one gesture he seemed so much bigger, canceling out the light all around.

            It was in his face, she realized. The monster began there and shifted out of him to encompass him entirely. Even as she watched him, he bowed his head, his dark curls falling around his face and casting deep shadows beneath the sharp bones of his cheeks, the hard lines around his mouth. His broad shoulders shifted beneath his dark uniform, his hand tightening around his lightsaber hilt before loosening again as if testing it. “Allow me to rectify the situation then,” he murmured. “I will see you dead if you will not submit yourself to my tutelage.” His dark eyes shimmered as he spoke, deep black holes in that pale face. “I can’t afford to have you realize just how strong you are, what kind of weapon you can become. Better to solve the problem now than watch you endure and become something considerably more.”

            Rey’s lips parted at his words, her heart beginning to pound. “No.”

            The Knight motioned to her waist with a slight nod of his head. “Arm yourself,” he advised her stonily.

            She shook her head at him, her fingers squeezing around the hilt at her waist nonetheless. “No.”

            Kylo Ren closed his eyes for a long moment, seeming to breathe in time to the world around him. And when his eyes came open, he was already lifting the lightsaber at his side and swinging.

            Rey immediately slid backward, grappling with the hilt of her saber. The wild red lightsaber sliced in a wide arc and she would only realize later that he had never meant to harm her, that he had only meant to spur her into defending herself and she had walked right into his trap. She had her own lightsaber in her palm a moment later as Kylo Ren recoiled and stood ready again with his weapon falling to his side comfortably. As he watched, she brought the hilt to her waist and ignited it with both hands, one palm stacked over the other, feeling the power jar her as it always did when she activated it.

            The expression on his face spoke more than any words he could’ve spilled then. Satisfaction. Primal lust at the power he beheld. And attraction to her, a moth to a flame. She found herself jolted by that for a moment, her brow furrowing slightly, but she pushed it away quickly.

            She would show him what flames did to moths.

            Angrily, she charged at him, the saber swinging in her hands. The Knight drew back, his eyes following her movement instinctively, the arc of her weapon as it shone across his face in passing and turned his skin a vibrant aqua with its light. Rey brought the blade down and then immediately swung again, slicing upward. He allowed it to slide past him easily as he bent his torso away. Even as she charged, he moved to avoid her effortlessly in the face of her swings. His lightsaber came up only to parry, his strength ringing through his weapon as he deflected her strikes, forcing her away as she engaged.

            She didn’t understand, didn’t know how she had done it the last time. She knew she was unskilled with the lightsaber and she regretted how slow her training was progressing. But she had been fluid once before in her battle with him, had left him a reminder on his face as a testament to her strength; she was staring the reminder head on, cloaked in the blue of her saber, the thin shining scar that crossed his pale face almost angrily. But now she was all brash assaults and no coordination, no strategy. And he knew it. He had yet to actually attack her, his lightsaber swinging, his body spinning as he parried and deflected. He battled her and defended himself with a style that avoided harming her even from the searing erratic wildness of the saber’s crossguard.

            And she hated to admit that he was beautiful. As she fought to drive him back, to inflict damage, he was agile and lithe in evading her attacks, a long lean shadow. Even as he spun, giving her full advantage of his back, she couldn’t seem to get one strike in as his red lightsaber would suddenly appear to counter her and push her off.

            “This is what you wanted!” she shouted at him almost in frustration in the midst of a breath.

            His dark eyes flew to her face, momentarily leaving the swing and slash of her weapon though he still brushed it off with a swipe of his blade. “Yes,” he answered easily, that deep voice of his sounding almost disappointed. “And you are left wanting.”

            His response left her boiling. She attempted more strength, a faster strike, more movement. And he still easily deflected her except now he was no longer playing games. He parried an assault from her and swung his blade in a circle, causing her own lightsaber to lock and follow his. He brought the blades upward outside of her range, the light energy of the sabers attempting to recoil from each other at every moment, and she barely had a chance to drag her blade back in before he swung again in a wide arc, still outside of her reach but close enough to have her withdraw. She staggered backward across fallen branches and dirt and then spun in the middle of the duel, looking over her shoulder before retreating and running.

 

            He was brought back to the day he had fought her in the snow on Starkiller, in the white landscape of snow-topped trees and pale darkness. How she would attack recklessly in an attempt to penetrate his defenses, to allow herself a moment to move, the advantage to run from him. His instincts had thrilled at the way she had dashed and he had realized then how much he enjoyed the chase of things, a predator after his prey. But to have her would be a prize beyond all things and he had wanted her. He had _wanted_ her, more than he had wanted anything before. He had wanted her at his side, in his thoughts, under his training. In his bed. He had wanted to mold her then into the perfect weapon even if it meant displacing himself on the pedestal for Snoke. She would be his offering to the Supreme Leader and to the Dark Side, would cement him firmly in league with the First Order the way he never felt he had been before. She had been beautiful in her fury and he had wanted to conquer that, to nurse it into something more. To make her realize what emotion, what _anger_ , could bring about, what sort of havoc it could wreak.

            Now he trailed her as she made the same errors, as she repeated her earlier steps to escape him. He followed and he felt a satisfaction deep inside, a longing that wouldn’t be quelled. How often would he have to shadow her like this, chase her, before she became his? Before she allowed herself to fall to him?

            She stumbled in mid-flight and the mistake brought her down to a knee roughly. He was upon her in an instant, his lightsaber deflecting hers as she threw it up frantically to defend herself. His weapon shoved her blue blade aside and wedged it into the ground at their side, stabbing it in deep and holding it there under his own saber. And then his free arm lashed out, his hand taking hold of her by the chin roughly and he brought her face up to lock eyes with his.

 

            He was taller than she had originally thought. Or maybe it had to do with the fact that she had rarely found herself in a position to appreciate his height. At the very least he towered a half foot over her while she stood and now, on her knees before him, his darkness only served to exaggerate the difference. He was a shadow that blocked the sun, casting darkness over her world.

            She found herself locked with him, her light eyes to his black stare, his fingers tight on her chin. Even as she fought to turn her attention to her blade embedded in the dirt beside them, she couldn’t pull her gaze away, couldn’t yank herself out of his grip. But it wasn’t a physical restraint; he had her with the deep pits of his eyes, the clench to his jaw, the curling hair. He was barely breathing as compared to her heavy pants. She blinked up at him rapidly, her heart pounding in her ears, her entire body seizing in fear.

            _I will never surrender to you. Never._

            His head tilted, snapping to the side a bit as his brow furrowed and she realized desperately that he had heard her words, had dragged her thoughts from her very mind. His eyes had not left hers though and as she breathed harshly that dark stare focused on her, drawing her in toward him. She found herself heaving, her body struggling to remain upright from the weariness of sparring with him, of having to deal with him head on. He was a powerful presence and she couldn’t have looked away or turned from him even if she had tried. She was locked in his hold, her blade lodged into the ground under his red saber and dragging dirt up like a wheel trapped in mud but she couldn’t seem to pull her attention away from him. And he sensed it, his fingertips dragging along her skin, his grip on her chin tight. She could only yield to him at this point, as she had wanted to submit numerous times in their bout on that snowy landscape so many months before when he had proven to be formidable even wounded. It was surrender or die trying and she was unwilling to give up her life there to him. He would have to fight her for it and if this was the final moment then she would go with her secrets and her desires untold.

            He spoke then as if he had heard her decision, as if he had read it across her face. “So willful,” he whispered deeply, his lips barely moving, his dark gaze leaving her eyes and settling on her mouth blankly. “Such anger that you shimmer in the darkness. And you are _stunning_.”

            She blinked at him rapidly, her figure rigid in his palm. But her eyes slid shut willingly as he bent his head to hers.

 

            He could still taste her as he watched Takodana slip away beneath the rising shuttle. Staring out the transparisteel windows of the transport, he continued to feel the impression of her lips on his from when he had stolen the kiss from her. After everything, all that had been left for him had been to feel something from her and she had been open to him, restrained but present.

            He had kissed her, pressing his mouth to hers and it had taken her a long moment to respond. But when she had, it had been immediate, her head tilting upward to allow him access. The kiss had started small, the mere brush of lips, but at her seeming curiosity, it had turned into more. He had momentarily forgotten all about his blade forcing hers into the ground, had forgotten what they had been fighting about entirely. She had done that to him, erasing everything around them and somehow bringing him directly into her, focusing him on her completely and absolutely. All he had known then was her response to him and when he had forced her lips apart inquisitively, the kiss had turned into more, had turned into something frantic and savage. A moan had trailed out of her at his assault, at his tongue upon hers. He had forgotten himself, his blade locking with hers and falling to the wayside as he had tasted her, as he had taken her in deeply, breathing at one with her.

            She had smelled of the trees, of the breeze that had lifted around them in that small clearing. He couldn’t remember the last time he had tasted the wind on his tongue but he had found himself suddenly longing for it.

Her hand had lifted to grip his shoulder almost desperately and then it had risen to anchor into the dark curls at the nape of his neck and it had been more than he had been prepared for. He had fallen to a knee right beside her, unexpectedly weak, their blades held in frail grips at their sides. His hand had darted to clamp down on the back of her neck as well, to wrench her against him. Her tongue had become tentative in his mouth but he had prodded her with a deeper kiss, urging her for more, opening her up as he’d tugged her closer. She had responded with renewed curiosity, with a sudden need that neither had anticipated as she had shifted forward, reaching.

            And coming back to himself, he had broken from her mouth abruptly, had pressed his forehead to hers to catch his breath. It had come in pants, hers in gasps, and she had clung to him, to his hair as if he had been her lifeline to shore and she hadn’t realized she’d been floundering.

            He had attempted to understand her internal thoughts, read them from the surface of her mind because his own had been much too chaotic. But hers had been a whirlwind as well and he had tried to shift through them with a grimace, had tried to comprehend her hazy words and the images that had accompanied them. Confusion. Fear. Panic.

            Desire-

            And her wayward thoughts suddenly shooting at him angrily even as she returned a kiss with a ferocity he hadn’t been prepared for, venom hovering between them in the midst of their hunger.

_You used me as a shield that day! You tried to save yourself from your own guard! But then you saved me and I don’t…I don’t understand why-_

            _No,_ he shook his head roughly, still locked against her lips, still lost in her as he breathed her scent in. _No. I tried to stop them. I needed to stop them. You were never a shield-_

            He had reared back then abruptly, breaking from her mouth and staring at her. He didn’t have to explain himself to her, to _anyone_. In sudden anger at himself that he would disclose as much to her, he had deactivated his lightsaber in a sharp motion, leaving hers to tear at the ground by itself. He had recoiled from her, his hand dropping away from the back of her neck abruptly, feeling how cold his skin felt to part from hers.

            For a moment, she hadn’t allowed him to go, her fingers firmly anchored in the waves of dark hair at the nape of his neck. The sensation, half arousing, half painful, had torn a sound from him as he had been brought back down, locking him in his kneel before her. He had met her eyes in a fog, lost in her yearning gaze and wanting more from her then than he had been prepared for.

            But he had somehow reached up through the haze, his gloved hand taking hold of hers and realizing momentarily how small it felt in his grasp. He had somehow detached her grip from him, staring into her light eyes then as he had merely held her fingers in his. Her gaze had searched his for an answer frantically, for a reason as to why something had just transpired between them.

            But he had felt the coldness, the _emptiness_ , return to him as he had finally stood to his feet, dropping her hand coolly. She had remained on the ground, her lightsaber biting into the ground at her side until she had deactivated it vacantly, her wide eyes still caught to him.

            He had stared down at her for a long moment, uncertain as to what to say but wanting to return to her then, to drop back to his knees before her and drag her back against his mouth. Drag her closer than his lips, into himself, down deep inside where he knew nothing but darkness and cold for her light to shed warmth.

            Instead, merely dropping his eyes away, he had turned on his heel and strode away through what felt like imaginary molasses, his feet almost dragging.

            He had swooped down to pick up his helm along the way and he had left her staring after him in silence as he had left her in the Takodana woods.

 

**Preview:**

She had been wrong. She had been _so_ wrong. There was no other woman in his arms, pressed between his hard body and the washroom counter. There was no one else because he was here.

He was _here_.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for the kudos and comments, guys! I appreciate them so much! I published the fanmix I created for this fic over at 8tracks. I'll try to add the link somewhere in my profile in case you want to take a listen. I'll have a link to the tracklisting post I made to my tumblr as well if you just want to see what tracks I used.


	5. Chapter Five

A/N: This is where it heads a bit into M territory. In a few chapters we'll head into E territory.

Also here are the links to the Emergence playlist and to the tumblr post for the tracklist. They're on my profile as well:

[ **http://8tracks.com/tasogareban/emergence** ](http://8tracks.com/tasogareban/emergence)

[ **http://dayzeechayn.tumblr.com/post/140994471552/emergence-soundtrack** ](http://dayzeechayn.tumblr.com/post/140994471552/emergence-soundtrack)

 

Chapter Five:

 

            When she visited him again, she hadn’t even been aware that she had been doing it. It had been unintentional. Had it not been for the nudge of his voice in the tendrils of thought in her head, she would have been perfectly unaware.

            The refresher was full of steam after the hot shower she had taken. She had needed to soothe her weary muscles after the day she’d had. She lifted her head to the mirror over the counter she leaned on, reaching out to swipe a wet palm along the surface to clear the steam away. Her pale face stared back at her, drops of water trailing down her cheeks and chest into the towel wrapped around her slender frame. She was exhausted after a long day of training and her very body trembled from exertion. They had begun to focus on levitation, on using the Force to lift heavier items, Luke at her side prodding her quietly, urging her to breathe and to try again when she had faltered.

            The Force was a fickle thing. She understood that she needed to channel it, allow it to work through her, that she couldn’t force it the way she did the limbs of her body or the thoughts in her head.

            But she would not be caught at odds again the way she had been on Takodana before Kylo Ren.

            A moment later she closed her eyes and shook her head at herself roughly. His name elicited strange shivers through her, partly from fear, partly from something that she refused to allow herself to feel.

            She did not associate with murderers.

            With a sigh, she opened her eyes. She was mentally and physically straining with weariness now and all she had wanted to do was sleep except that she had wanted to wash away the sweat and dirt she had built up throughout the training.

            Now she merely stared at her face blindly, light eyes coasting over the freckles dusting her nose and forehead. She looked tired, felt the weariness through every part of her. She could very well fall asleep standing up, she realized dimly. As the steam again clouded over the mirror, she was glad to hide behind it. She didn’t want to see the dark circles that had appeared under her eyes, the proof of her exhaustion written across her face. She merely wanted a moment to breathe, to slip into silence and just let go. That would come with sleep tonight, she understood, and she let her eyes fall shut with a soft sigh.

            In the darkness behind her closed eyelids, she felt him pulse, beckoning.

            He reached for her now, something that she hadn’t expected to happen, especially with the way they had left things on Takodana. She had expected him to pull away, to shut himself off from her. Instead, he had flitted closer in the cool darkness, seemingly curious with her. No, not curious. _Taken_ by her. The moth to the flame still.

            He didn’t nudge at her often though; sometimes her thoughts drifted toward him and he reverberated in the darkness, aware of her but rarely open to receiving her. But tonight, perhaps something had happened that had opened him up to her, had urged him to accept her prods. She couldn’t even fault him for she had unknowingly called to him all those times she had appeared in his path.

            Now his voice was in her head, in her ear, a low murmur, somehow emotionless but still stroking her skin as if he stood beside her. Her name came to her, whispered, his tone almost lazy and she felt the slightest breath along the curl of her ear. The caress sent a shiver down her spine, her lips parting as her head slowly fell back. She found herself wanting more, one more second of his heat, another trailing of breath across her sensitive skin. A part of her reared up, willing to fight, to push him away. Her physical body, however, was done. She couldn’t do anything more tonight, not after the long day she’d had.

            He was in a refresher as well. As if she had teleported a large distance in a thought, she opened her eyes and found herself in the middle of a brightly lit washroom of black tile, also full of steam. And he stood before a basin as well, hunched over, unclothed from his waist upward.

            He was tall, leanly muscled. She had never seen him like this and she stared, her heart dropping out under her. She had seen attractive men in her life but he was more than that; he was striking without the confining black uniform and the heavy metal helmet hiding away the black waves of hair and the expressionless, pale face.

            His back was curled, his spine prominent in the harsh light overhead and he lifted a cupped handful of water to his face, wet fingers rubbing across his eyes before running through his damp hair. One hand fell to the counter the basin rested on, the other lifting to the wall, and she stared at him, eyes running over the hard ridges of bone under his fair skin. Over the scars crossing that same fair skin. She came forward a step, wanting a closer look. As she did so, he lifted the other hand to the wall as well, his palms framing a steamed mirror between them. He straightened, the uncoiling muscles of his back forming cuts in his skin. Droplets of water fell from his wet curls, dripping to his neck, trailing down his spine, and she lifted a hand.

She wanted to feel his skin under her fingertips, wanted to follow the lines of his muscles and scars, take a drop of water on her tongue. Savor _more_ than water on her tongue. She could still taste him on her lips; the feel of him from Takodana, his hard body pressed to hers and the scent of woods all around them. And she suddenly found herself desiring him again, the way she had when he had broken their kiss.

            A small movement in front of his tall, trim frame stole her attention away from her longing and there was someone there, another person suddenly present, facing his mirror as well. She stopped, her brow drawing inward, the hand she hadn’t realized she had lifted toward him freezing in mid-reach. That person had not been there before; there had been no room for another person between his hard body and the washroom counter. But now, with his hands firmly on either side of the mirror, she saw the second figure enveloped by his arms, dwarfed by his tall form. As if he had never meant to lean on the wall so much as trap the figure between himself and the counter.

            He wasn’t alone. She blinked, recoiling in her head and in her physical form. And the thoughts that flew inside her head were chaotic. Of course he would not be alone, why did she think he would be? He was a man underneath the exterior of demon, a handsome one, but a demon nonetheless.

            Everything she had thought she had come to know of him was wrong. She had somehow expected to be the only one that he was currently fixated on but why wouldn’t he spend his nights with another, especially since she was beyond reach? And why did she find herself upset that he would turn to someone else? Why was she almost angry?

            He was a _murderer_.

            He bent toward a head of short and dark wet hair, the refresher light throwing shadows across his back once more as his lean muscles undulated. It was a woman that he held cornered between himself and the counter, a slender frame that he drew close to. And as he brushed along the woman’s back with his hips, Rey felt a corresponding caress along her back simultaneously, a familiar heat along her shoulders. She lowered her head at the sensation, dimly aware that she was still clothed in a mere towel though the water on her skin had dried away. The woman in his embrace was also clothed only in a towel and as he dropped a hand away from the wall, he nudged the woman’s head forward with a small sweep of his nose, his mouth brushing the nape of her neck with the gesture.

            She felt the ghost of a caress along the back of her own neck and her breath caught, her heart tripping over itself. Her ghost was soft and warm along her skin and electricity streaked down her spine at his touch, her skin cooling as the phantom at her back drew away slightly.

            Before her, he brought his hand to the woman’s back, the flat of his middle finger trailing up her spine before he pressed his palm down to follow suit and she felt that same spectral touch, the warm skin sliding along her own back. Her voice left her in a sigh, a whisper, the beginning of a hazy sentence. Then he was leaning forward, his mouth following the path his hand had taken along the woman’s back as his long fingers wrapped up and over her shoulder. Her words became a low, drawn out moan as the caress was mirrored across her own flesh and she couldn’t help herself, her eyes slowly sliding shut to experience the sensations fully. Her skin prickled, hot and cold, her body trembling, and as he laughed faintly against the woman’s skin, she felt that same breath tickle her neck.

            She had been wrong. She had been _so_ wrong. There was no other woman in his arms, pressed between his hard body and the washroom counter. There was no one else because he was here.

            He was _here_.

            Her eyes slid open, unwilling and nearly unable. He was suddenly overpoweringly present, his heat, his scent of metal and woods. The feel of his lips on her skin. She reached out with a trembling hand, pressed against her washroom counter once more and she thrust a shaky palm against the mirror. It had clouded over again with steam and as his mouth trailed along the skin between her shoulder and neck, she swiped jerkily. Clearing away the steam from the mirror, the reflection revealed his pale form at her back. One hand was still raised to the wall at her side in the reflection, the other now wrapped around the front of her neck, his arm yanking her flush along his length roughly. She was pulled against him by an invisible force, felt his hardness alongside her lower back and her breath caught in her throat.

            He was putting images in her head, warping the washroom around her and leaving her dizzy, half floating and half falling. The mirror reflected him at her back and she was quite aware of him through the thin towel wrapped around her breathless body, but he was not physically in the washroom with her. Her eyes skirted down blindly to her own figure and though she stood rigidly, she was not restrained. She was still alone in her washroom.

            Her gaze drifted back up to the mirror, coming to rest on his tall, dark-haired reflection at her back.

            His laugh came again, low and hot, his tongue tasting the skin of her bare shoulder.

            _This is what you wanted, why you called on me. We were not meant to fight and you understood that before I did._

            Her head fell back at the electric pulse of his voice in her head and she suddenly found cushion on the hard curve of his broad shoulder. His smooth bare skin under hers felt real, much too real, and the sensation brought a sudden warmth between her thighs. Her eyes slid closed once more at the slickness, at the shiver that sparked down her spine.

            He made a soft sound in her ear, his breath hitching. He must have read her desire from her somehow but she found that she didn’t care then. She realized that she was beginning to question less, wanted to feel more. His agreement reverberated through her, entangling itself in her thoughts and beginning to overwhelm the small niggling doubts that still hung in the shadows of her mind.

            She wanted to touch him. She wanted to see how real he felt, how close he actually waited.

            Her right hand skittered along the counter, roaming the surface before slowly lifting hesitantly. She could feel him along her back, felt every part of him as she shifted against his hips and the motion brought a slow groan from him. It was a sound she did not recognize but it lifted the small hairs at the nape of her neck temptingly. She wanted to hear it again, wanted him to make that sound again in her ear. Wanted to force him to make it again.

            But she also wanted more, wanted to see if she could feel all of him or only what he allowed her to feel.

            His wet hair was cold against her skin as he pressed his head to hers, as his mouth slid up her shoulder to taste her neck, just below her ear. That spot right there. Her lips parted, her body arching into his leanly muscled one, reaching longingly. Her hand found his face and trailed his jaw before moving further, fingers finally digging into that head of slick black hair. She pushed backward into him as his arms hardened around her almost frighteningly, as she senselessly pulled at him.

            “Come to me,” he whispered into her ear hoarsely, his breath hot, his voice resounding deep within her flesh. His fingers traced her chest lightly, leaving a blazing trail as they lowered to the knot holding her towel to her breast. “Come to me-“

            She shook her head futilely along his shoulder, her brow turning upward even as she stirred under his touch. “I can’t,” she whispered into the corner of his mouth and the feel of him was excruciating. “I can’t-“

            “Then let me have you. Now. Here,” he murmured, drawing back to run his lips along the nape of her neck. And his hand lifted, fingers trailing down her temple before tapping lightly against it. “Here.”

            Her stomach flipped at his words, at the slightest touch of his tongue to the shell of her ear. “I…I-“

            And she broke off as he waited, as his fingers left her temple and slid down the surface of her cheek, his mouth closing around the slope of her neck and biting gently. The shiver weakened her knees, her jaw falling open because she was going to do it, _yes_ , she was going to give herself to him in this strange and hazy world that was half real and half dream, this world that existed outside of them and everything they stood for-

            The hand skimming her chest took hold of the knot and twisted it loose with a flick of his wrist. The towel came open, slipping from her breast and her burning body was suddenly kissed with a breath of cold air. The change brought her eyes open as did his, but while she was suddenly frantic to find herself exposed to him, his dark gaze caught to her face reflected in the mirror before drifting down.

            “You’re…beautiful,” he whispered and he sounded as if he didn’t understand, as if he couldn’t fathom how he could find her so stunning.

            The tone of his voice caused her to flame even more and she moved to turn mindlessly, to whirl into him and to burrow into his chest, to hide herself from both his gaze and her own.

            He didn’t allow her, his jaw clenching as he fought to hold her still. She was forced to face forward, her hand still caught by his and anchored at the nape of his head of dark curls. The reach lengthened the line of her body as he set her forward once more, his other hand hard on her hip. And his lips parted as he stared at her reflection, blinking rapidly.

            Then his hand left her wrist where he had pinned it to his neck, fingers trailing down hesitantly along the sensitive skin and moving toward her breast.

            He was going to touch her. He was going to touch her and this needed to end. Now, before he could feel anymore of her, make her feel anything more for _him_. She didn’t want to feel anything from him, for him. She didn’t want any of this, didn’t know if her heart could withstand it if she let him in, this _monster-_

            She closed her eyes tightly, her brow furrowing with the effort, and she heard his voice suddenly become distant, calling for her.

            _“Rey-“_

            Her eyes snapped open a moment later and she was alone in her own washroom, her body pressed up against her own counter, her towel hanging open off the curve of her hips. Her hand fell to her side limply and she was suddenly so cold, already forgetting the feel of his warmth. With a shaky breath, she brought her palms to the counter, leaning her entire weary weight on it as she struggled to regain herself.

            The slickness between her thighs was not as easy to forget.

 

**Preview:**

His voice came feverishly, deep with his need for her and she found herself set aflame, desirable yet again. _Beautiful_. He wanted her, craved her as much as she now did him. But he was coming apart at the seams and the early stages of his exquisite shattering were beginning to reverberate throughout the First Order like an earthquake. His tremors were palpable from where she resided and she felt almost proud that she could bring a man to his knees with hunger for her.

 


	6. Chapter Six

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a short chapter but I felt like I needed to send something out and I had to make time to do it, lol! Thank you all for the comments and kudos, keep them coming! I love making new friends and rambling on and on about my OTPs! Also if you get a chance, please check out the playlist! I feel like it can only add to the fic!

Chapter Six:

 

            She spent an inordinate amount of will power avoiding him after that, avoiding the thought of him. He was the insistent shadow at the back of her mind and she didn’t understand how he had suddenly come to have such a hold on her. She repeated mantras that Luke had taught her, summoning strength and stillness, calm. But his presence burned her from the inside, set her aflame when she least expected it, demanded to be acknowledged when she needed peace.

            How had it come to this?

            Nights were the hardest. She couldn’t control her dreams, could barely control herself. She woke many times, so many nights in so many weeks wet between her legs, almost certain that someone had been in her room, in her bed. But she couldn’t bear to face him if it _had_ been him. If it had only been a dream, it would’ve been fine but once she had forged that connection when she had first mistakenly sought him out, or possibly even before that, she hadn’t been able to shut him away afterward. Her body craved every part of him shamefully, her soul distinctly aware that he was close enough to summon.

            His voice still echoed and she was fairly certain he had called to her in her dreams, that she had probably called to him as well.

            _Come to me._

            She would never be able to follow through on his command even if she wanted to. To walk into his territory was the equivalent of killing herself. If she even made it through the door, she was sure he would have his fill of her and then he would be done with her.

            She could resist him, she knew it. She just needed more training.

            _You need a teacher. I can show you the ways of the Force._

            She slept fitfully, always. Not enough to awaken refreshed but just enough to follow through with her trainings, with her meditations. But there was always that small piece of her that craved more, that craved _him_. And she didn’t know how it had started for they had begun as enemies.

            Hadn’t they? He had killed his own father, had taken away the first person who could have been the promise of something better for her. She had waited her entire life for her family and Han Solo had been the first good thing that had pointed to what she had needed. And then _he_ had taken it away from her with treachery and the firing of an erratic lightsaber.

            _Come to me._

            Yes, they had been enemies. They still were. But he had shown her another face, had been merciful in his search through her head when looking for the map to Luke Skywalker’s whereabouts. He had fought her to the edge of a snowy cliff and then offered her an alternative, had thrown out the opportunity to teach her instead of wiping her off the face of the planet. He had seen something in her and he had wanted to cultivate it. He had saved her in the bright corridors of his base when she had taken the blaster fire and he could have easily let her die. He had let her go on Takodana as well when he had clearly had the upper hand on her.

            _Come to me._

            And sometimes, when he unknowingly whispered to her, when he unwittingly called to her, she felt the smallest hint of regret in his presence. It would be tenuous at best, non-existent for the most part. But in the darkness, deep into the night when she awoke or when she found herself unable to sleep, she felt the tendrils of it. Blue in color somehow, cold and adrift in the blackness. She felt it most when she knew he slept, as if he couldn’t control what he felt, what he dreamt. And those blue wisps would suffocate her, make her feel as if she were falling endlessly, as if she would never land. She felt as if darkness would swallow her forever, this unending feeling of cold pain and helplessness. Was this what he felt all the time, this agony, this regret? What did he regret?

            _Come to me._

            Then he would recover, surface from his deep sleep into the web of their shared bond to find her hovering within reach of his thoughts and he would rebound immediately. Flaring suddenly as brilliantly as the sun within the depths of a black hole, he would send her equal flashes of light and darkness. A glimpse of fingers, his mouth hovering over hers as he whispered her name into it. His tongue as he parted her lips to taste her. The brush of his hand across her breast then the shift downward, the feel of him pressed against her as she moaned helplessly, as she came apart under his fingers, her cries filling his mouth. All the things that she couldn’t comprehend as she came awake alone in her own bed. It was a reflex for him, as if he needed to cover his weaknesses, his pains. His repentances. As if he needed her to see him as something more than what he really was, needed to make her see him as something that he was not.

            She was strong enough to fight him, could sever their connection. She could do it.

            Weeks upon weeks of this pursuit, of this chase, of this same thing where neither of them had the upper hand. And then she would sleep and he would reestablish his hold on her almost brutally, would awaken her to his wanting touch in the cool darkness. She didn’t actively search him out for if she did she would remember more of her dreams. They wouldn’t be dreams after all; they would be visitations, as they had been in the early days of this entanglement they had between them, and he would then be able to recall them just as well as her. But these nocturnal visits were elusive to the waking eye and would then vanish from them both with the light of day. They would leave her in pain from desiring him which in turn left him destructive at sensing the sting of her ache, as if someone had physically hurt her. That he could feel her, feel _for_ her, from such a distance frightened her more than his actual fury. She could, in turn, feel his rage across the galaxy, deep in her veins, singing through her very sensitive body as he tore consoles apart; the sweep of his unpredictable lightsaber, as volatile as the man wielding it, the glow of the vibrant blade as he drove it into metal, ripped entire rooms to shreds in wrath.

            _Come to me!_

            His voice came feverishly, deep with his need for her and she found herself set aflame, desirable yet again. _Beautiful_. He wanted her, craved her as much as she now did him. But he was coming apart at the seams and the early stages of his exquisite shattering were beginning to reverberate throughout the First Order like an earthquake. His tremors were palpable from where she resided and she felt almost proud that she could bring a man to his knees with hunger for her.

            But she avoided him still until she could feel him heaving in desperation through their connection. He would awaken from dreams where they met, where he had her body and soul only to awaken alone, drenched in sweat and desiring her in his bed. She was killing him, slowly but surely, and she would then find herself horrified that she could inflict this agony on another person. She would never have wanted it to become what it had. But she was in the same anguish herself, awakening in a cold sweat, reaching for someone who did not share her bed even as he brought her to shuddering climaxes and made her see stars without leaving the earth.

            Luke would be ashamed of her, she was sure of it. But she couldn’t just ignore what she felt even though she tried with everything she was.

            This was what life had become and she couldn’t be sure whether she regretted it or not.

 

* * *

 

**Preview:**

But he would be fighting her tonight, no matter where her thoughts fled. Perhaps he had finally had plenty of her push and pull, had been driven to supplication enough to no longer relish the hard surface beneath his knees anymore.


	7. Chapter Seven

Chapter Seven:

 

            The command shuttle was a shade in the blue night, swooping low before coming to hover at the base of the cliff. She stood above at the precipice overlooking the beach, felt the hard winds as the shuttle lowered to the land below, as the sand rippled under its descent.

            He appeared beside her, his dark garb shoved by the winds as well. She did not question why he would be there then though she did find it strange that she would dream of this, would summon him to her side. That either of them would be affected by the world around them when they stood there incorporeally. She couldn’t be sure whether this was a dream or a visitation but she did not know this place and from his cool puzzlement in their shared web of thoughts, he did not recognize this setting either. She felt herself turn slightly, her head only, and she did not raise her eyes to his tall broad shadow at her side.

            Nights were still the hardest between them.

            “At this rate, I will be sleeping fitfully for many more nights to come,” he murmured in a slightly cross tone, exasperation resounding deeply throughout it though it was a human voice, unsullied as he did not wear his helmet.

            She finally lifted her eyes to look at him in the night. He cocked his head and met her gaze after a moment from such a height, black curls flying around his temple, his skin ghostly in the little slant of moonlight that reached him under his raised and heavy hood. He wore no mask for her tonight though the fact that he wore the rest of his uniform did little to ease the small shiver of trepidation. His frame was coiled tightly as if anticipating danger, an ambush perhaps. He was not here willingly, not to his mind. She felt his aggravation, his anger that she would continue to call to him even though he knew she couldn’t control her dreams of him, couldn’t help herself. That she would drag his torment out another night more when he was stretched thin as it was.

            “It isn’t my intention,” she whispered, her words nearly lost in the roar of the wind.

            “It never is.” He turned his hooded head forward, expressionless once more, his stark profile barely visible and his voice soft. He exhaled deeply in resignation after a moment. “Why have you brought me here tonight?” He asked bluntly.

            His tone did nothing to convince her that he regretted being there though. Even though she saw only the side of that long face, there was still the slightest flicker of curiosity in his gaze and she turned forward again, a smile twitching at the edges of her lips. “I’m not sure,” she replied truthfully and she merely lifted a hand to point down at the ship as it finally landed, as the loud engines shut down, leaving behind the crashing of the ocean on the beach, of the soft whisper as the waters receded.

            “Did you think of my ship before you slept tonight? Of me?” he asked, lips barely moving. Still the same disinterest in his voice though she felt something far more in the thread that connected them, in his unspoken thoughts; a longing, a hope that perhaps she had indeed thought of him as she had laid her head down.

            For a moment she had a flash of his hands behind her blind eyes, of his long fingers as his hand curled below her line of vision. There was the tug of his hand in her hair, slight, sweetly painful, and she swallowed before forcing the vision faded away. She had allowed that vision to come to life and at the worst time.

            His breath had hitched beside her and she became aware of him straightening rigidly, of his hands clenching into fists at his sides. He had felt it, had caught the small ripples of her visions, the shivers that reverberated in their shared bond.

            Because in the end that was what it was; a shared bond. A Force bond. And neither of them had asked for it or wanted it.

            But he would be fighting her tonight, no matter where her thoughts fled. Perhaps he had finally had plenty of her push and pull, had been driven to supplication enough to no longer relish the hard surface beneath his knees anymore.

            She hesitated, dropping her hand once more to her side. “I…think of you every night,” she whispered and she had hoped the crashing waves, the now absent wind, would’ve carried her words away and drowned them under the weight of the sea.

            But he turned his hooded head, a gesture she caught from the corner of her eye though she did not meet his gaze again.

            He shifted slightly, nearing soundlessly. She became aware of him then through every part of her as he moved, aware of him entirely; what she had come to recognize as his scent of metal, of the material of his helm mixed with his own skin, and cedar, his loose clothing brushed up along her side. She wore her usual beige dress, the white sleeveless shirt with the wraps along her arms, and it was that small span of bare flesh that bore the brunt of his heat.

            “And every night it becomes harder and harder to let go,” he said quietly, his head bowing toward her, his face shadowed under his hood.

            He was too close then, was too much to take. She was in his shade and it covered her completely, consumed her in its darkness, the moonlight falling away. She was afraid to turn her face toward him, afraid that she would give herself over to him completely right then and there, her eyes unable to even blink as she was assaulted by his sheer presence.

            “You whisper to me nightly, call on me constantly, even without realizing it,” he said to her huskily and there was a sensual undertone in his voice, low and deep. But anger ran just below his words, simmering. She was reminded of a big black cat, stretching and purring a moment before rearing to strike. He was at the edge of his rope, just about done with her mind games. He brought his face closer to hers and a slight shiver coursed through her at his nearness. She had half a mind to turn into his hood, to block out the world around them so that only they remained in the darkness underneath that cowl. There was a knowing smile in his words when he spoke next, his breath caressing the small brown fly-aways that she could never control when she tied her hair back. “You may as well just _come_ to me.”

            The shuttle far down below released the ramp along the underbelly of the ship, pale yellow light streaking out into the blue night of the world.

            “The things I could teach you,” he was whispering, and his mouth grazed her ear, his nose brushing her dark hair. “So much more than the Force, more than we could ever hope to be. You would see the kind of power you could have if you just let me _have_ you.”

            Noise came from below, the dim sound of resounding footsteps on hard metal.

            Her breath was coming harder now, her chest rising and falling. She felt herself holding on to something, another cliff, with straining fingers. She would lose this battle, she knew. And if she listened to his words, if she let herself fall, she couldn’t even be sure she would regret it as she plummeted into the yawning abyss. Her eyes slid closed as he took that small step, bringing himself flush against her side, his bottom lip trailing along her temple. She couldn’t help but tilt her head toward his mouth, her lips parting as she breathed him in, that scent of dark woods and cold night. He moved to speak again, the words almost tangible along her skin. “Just let yourself-“

            _“Ben!”_

            The feminine cry rang out across the water from far below, echoing into the churning sea and out into the vast world beyond.

            Startled, her eyes came open at the sound. Beside her, Kylo Ren snapped his head away from her and toward the cliff, his overwhelming presence weakening slightly. Even as she struggled to regain her breath, he was darting toward the cliff edge, a streaking shadow in the night, leaving her side suddenly bereft of his heat. And as he stopped at the edge to look down, his entire form became rigid, almost painfully so.

            She blinked rapidly for a moment, her vision swimming. As she came back to herself, she read the hard lines of his shoulders under his cowl and top coat. The ragged coattails flew in the wind and he had come without his feral weapon, she realized dimly.

            Why had he come without his lightsaber?

            But that fact could change at a moment’s notice in this strange existence. Things could warp here, twist into something else with a thought. And while this wasn’t a typical dream, it was definitely not a visitation on her part. This was something more than she could understand but at the moment it didn’t matter.

            Though she continued to wonder hazily why he would come to her unarmed.

            She finally came to life. She stepped closer to his tall and tense form, and she lowered her gaze around his side, searching for what had him standing so rigidly.

            Kylo Ren himself had come from the belly of the shuttle far below, having stormed loudly down the ramp to then land silently on firm sand. The figure below was an exact replica of the man at her side. That man wore no helmet though and his black hood rested low along his back, his midnight-dark waves flying in the night breeze.

            And from directly below the cliff edge, another version of Rey streaked out, racing across the sand toward him. His pinched expression lightened, his furrowed brow straightening and then he caught her against his chest as she flung herself into him.

            They merely stared down at the couple on the beach in startled silence for a long moment.

            His counterpart held hers as if he couldn’t let her go, one arm wrapped around her waist, the other hand trapping her head to his shoulder and neck tightly.

            Rey stared, her jaw hanging open, her heart beating loudly in her ears. Beside her, the Master of the Knights of Ren stood perfectly still, the tails of his overcoat whipping madly in the non-existent wind.

            Below, her double pulled back from Kylo Ren’s mirror image slightly, her hands caught between them and against his chest as he brought his gloved fingers to her face. They exchanged words for a moment, her head shaking as she spoke inaudibly. He replied, his lips barely moving in response before he lowered his mouth to hers, as she raised her face to his.

            _This isn’t a dream. This isn’t a dream. This isn’t a dream. By the Force, this isn’t a **dream** -_

            The words screamed through Rey’s head, no doubt reverberating throughout their shared bond and burrowing deeply into Kylo Ren as well. She wasn’t dreaming and she wasn’t in the midst of visiting him. This was something else, something more and something far worse.

            _…prophecy?_

            Before her, Kylo Ren staggered backward, ramming roughly into her and forcing her sideways and back with his abrupt movements. He spun, his gestures wild, and as she found her footing she saw that he suddenly had his helm on beneath his raised hood. She could no longer see his face and she felt that same distance in their connection as he recoiled from her physically and psychically.

            _Wait. Wait! Don’t hide. Don’t hide from me-_

            _“Wait-“_ she cried, throwing a hand out after his retreating figure, her mental words brimming on her lips.

            He dodged her hands, withdrawing still, a darting flying shadow.

            “Ben, _wait_!” she shouted, her voice shrill and ringing in the night.

            But as he took another step, he faded from dream to the waking world, leaving her alone on the cliff edge, confused and bereft.

 

            Kylo Ren awoke from the nightmare sweating and shivering as if he had fallen ill, his breath leaving him in gasps. As he searched the walls of his room blindly, he realized that he barely recognized his own quarters much less the name he had taken on when he had left his former home. His birth name echoed in her voice, in his head, almost as if she had followed him into his world, as if Rey continued to call it still.

            And for a long, long moment after, he questioned why that would be a bad thing.

 

**Preview:**

He held himself still against her, his lean body firm, his lips unmoving below hers. She pressed a kiss to that tight mouth and then one last one before lowering herself back down and away. As her eyes came open, she gazed at him with shimmering eyes and his face blurred behind her tears. “Goodbye, Ben,” she whispered.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You guys are all amazing!! I love your comments, they cheer me up especially when I find myself needing them the most! Thanks so much!


	8. Chapter Eight

Chapter Eight:

 

            She felt nothing from him for weeks. As if he had left their plane of existence, he was suddenly gone from their connection. Her trainings suffered, her concentration becoming hectically unbalanced. Luke knew there was something amiss and if she were to be quite honest with herself, he probably knew exactly what the problem was. But every day he remained patient with her, working with her even as she continued to flag.

            She only realized much later, once she had established the path she was to take, that she’d seen something in Luke’s eyes the day that she had overexerted herself. An understanding. A reticence in acceptance, perhaps, but the acknowledgement had still been there even as he had continued with their exercises.

 

 

            That day, in the midst of her training, she faltered.

            She had wandered too far off the new base, had needed to get away to lose herself in the wild forests surrounding the latest Resistance headquarters. She had been told numerous times to be careful when she would leave the confines of the station; the woods surrounding the base had not been cleared fully and savage creatures roamed deep within, that these beasts hungered often and called in the night, were feral and ravenous. But her legs had carried her off mindlessly the way they had the day she had encountered Kylo Ren again in the ruins of Takodana. She had been foolish, she realized later, throwing caution to the wind and heading off into the forests. It hadn’t been until she had wandered for close to an hour that she understood that she had gone too far, that the creatures that inhabited the forests were not the same as the inferior ones that had remained just outside the barrier of the old base at D’Qar.

            She had finally halted in the middle of her trek, has scouted the area to find that nothing strayed too closely, and she had set her things down to practice her abilities. She had pushed herself too far that day and she had known immediately that she was too weak, especially then, to attempt the levitation of anything heavier than a slight object. But she had been angry with herself, angry with _him_ , that he would hide himself away from her, and she had been blinded. When had that become a problem? How long had she spent hoping he would disappear, would sever their connection since she hadn’t known how to accomplish the feat herself? She was tired of waking alone, trembling from his fingers and his mouth, so close to climax that she had needed to finish the job herself in the early morning hours all the while envisioning his face in her head hovering over hers, hungry for anything she would surrender to him.

            Now it seemed that he had split the bond for her and she was ungrateful, angry even? She didn’t understand herself, her very emotions, and she had lashed out in rage, reaching out and taking hold of the first thing she had spotted deep in the woods outside the Resistance base.

            She had strained too much, had misjudged her connection with the Force. The stone had been half her size, twice as wide, and she’d hefted it up and flung it with a frustrated yell. It had flown through the air and smashed into a tree, crippling it. The impact had been explosive, the crack resounding through the woods and echoing into the distance.

            She had stared for a moment, a hint of arrogance in the pride she had felt when she should have wondered what the commotion would bring to her doorstep.

            And she had been foolish in her thoughts. There would never be anyone to temper her again, she had told herself with conceit brimming to the surface. No one to tell her what she could or couldn’t do. She had the strength. She just needed the training, that was all. The things she could do if she were to just let herself loose, allow herself to _do_ and to _feel_. She could be more than herself, could do so much for the Resistance. She could bring the First Order to its knees especially when she had firsthand knowledge of how she had taken their most noteworthy Dark Knight down at her most inexperienced.

             Then a slow tremor had started deep inside, a horrified terror that anger had helped her achieve the feat, that she had allowed darkness in through her pride. Where had those thoughts come from? Whose voice was that in her head that sounded so much like hers? She couldn’t even fault the connection she had to the Master of the Knights of Ren for he had since distanced himself from her, had fled in the face of something he had not wished to accept.

            And then, in the midst of her panic, had come the small trickle of fluid from her nose. She had frowned, lifting a hand to touch the liquid and her fingers had come away stained with blood.

            _No. Oh, no-_

            She had turned and taken a single step before her legs had melted under her and taken her to the hard ground silently.

 

 

            When her eyes came open, she was in his room, resting on his low bed with the transparisteel wall to her right. Her head snapped up off his pillow, anticipation running through her. It had been a long while since she had been in close proximity to him besides dreaming with him. This was something else, something tangible.

            He leaned against the opposite wall to the bed, dressed in his dark clothes as was usual with him but he did not wear the overcoat and hood, and his helm was nowhere to be found. His features were tight, his brow drawn low and she recognized the anger there, saw the paleness to the scar that adorned his face.

            “Where am I?” she asked hoarsely.

            Her inane question brought him to cock his head at her. “Where do you think?” he scoffed at her.

            Oh. He was _very_ angry. Furious, in fact, though he hid the rage well if she were truthful with herself. At least his lightsaber hadn’t made an appearance yet and his room did seem to be getting on well. Swallowing slightly, she said, “I meant…am I dreaming? Am I actually visiting you right now?”

            He chuckled inwardly and the gesture caused his frame to pulse lightly. “You’re unconscious, somewhere out in some _forest_ where no one can find you.” And he sounded quite wrathful though he somehow seemed to keep this voice low and remote. “Where you will probably remain until something comes along and eats you for dinner.” His eyebrow arched, a dark curl slipping along his temple with the gesture. “No one knows what’s happened to you, scavenger.”

            Ah. And now they were back to Scavenger and Knight then.

            With a small grimace, she slowly sat up, her hands propping her unsteadily. “It’s fine. I’ll…wake myself up. I just taxed myself with that boulder, shouldn’t have been so-“

            “Don’t you listen?” he sneered at her. “You are _unconscious_ , not asleep. There is no waking up until your body is ready to wake up.” He chuckled again and this time the laugh was audible. “You’re trapped here.”

            She stared at him. “What do you mean trapped?” she asked warily.

            And now there was a sly look in his eyes, in the small twist of his lips. “I mean _trapped_. As in, you’re not going anywhere, not until something kills you in those woods. Because you decided to wander off into a forest full of creatures that are constantly hungering and never satisfied. Then you’ll just…disappear. From here. From out there.” He motioned with a nod of his head toward the window but she knew he meant the outside world, the real world. “Nothing to be done for it now.”

            Her eyes hurt from the strain of staring at him. “That’s…that’s not possible. I can’t be _trapped_ here. Not like this. Not with-“ She broke off, her breath quickening.

            “Me?” he finished for her curiously. “Can’t be trapped here with me?”

            She didn’t reply, a scowl forming on her face.

            His eyes dropped away as he feigned bemusement. “Was it not you looking for me? Calling to me?” he asked. “Did I imagine these last few weeks?”

            Before she could reply, he was moving on, lifting away from the wall smoothly, his hands falling at his sides easily.

            “Don’t worry,” he said patiently. “You won’t be trapped here with me. I can leave this place. You can’t. But soon enough, you won’t be trapped here either.”

            Her heartbeat picked up, the small heat of adrenaline rising inside. He was much too composed, too cold for her to be calm. “That…no-” she uttered and she shook her head roughly. “No. That’s silly. I’m perfectly fine. I just overexerted myself. I’m sure everything is fine. I just have to wake up-“

            She stared at him as he remained quiet under her rush of words, as he stood before her, a still and silent shadow.

            “There has to be something I can do,” she stated hastily, firmly. Quickly, she scooted to the edge of his bed, her legs falling off as she sat up. “Maybe if I just…just _will_ it, if I attempt to wake up. If I-“

            He merely stared at her as she rambled, his face blank though he tilted his head in feigned interest, eyebrows hitching as if he found her to be quite interesting.

            She realized moments later that he had fallen much too quiet and she raised her eyes back to meet his. She searched his expression closely, her brow drawing low. “You’re…pleased about this turn,” she said to him in a biting whisper, her mouth tightening. “You _want_ something to find me in that forest, want it to finish me off, to make me to disappear. To _die_ ,” she spat at him, her face contorting with resentment. “Because then maybe I’ll leave you alone in your darkness, your-”

            “There is no death,” he cut her off, taunting her almost innocently. “There is the Force.”

            His words froze her for a long painful moment, disbelief pounding throughout her ethereal form. Then fury rose from somewhere so deep inside that it threatened to crack her wide open and come pouring out of her like a geyser. She flew to her feet and her despair melted away into a full-blown rage, an anger so powerful that it almost threatened to drive her to her knees with its weight.

            She wanted to see him suffer then more than she had ever suffered in her entire life on the desert planet Jakku.

            Her hand rose out of nowhere and connected with his cheek. The crack of skin against skin rang through the room, resounding painfully.

            He barely moved though the slap had forced his head to the side. Exhaling almost impatiently, he faced her once more, his cheek reddening before her eyes.

            The complete lack of emotion, of reaction, angered her even more and she lifted her stinging palm to swing again.

            He caught her hand this time, black gloved fingers wrapping around her wrist and yanking her arm away from his face. The gesture pulled her forward, causing her to stumble into him. “That’s enough,” he hissed down at her and he squeezed her wrist tightly for a long moment, causing her to wince before he flung her arm away. “You should be thanking me. I’m the one who found you wandering in the ether. I’m the one who dragged your consciousness here, who is currently minding you until you _disappear_. Perhaps a little gratitude-“

            “Thank you,” she snapped at him and she shook her hand out, feeling the prickles across her entire palm as she turned her face away. She was appalled with herself even as she recovered; she was not a violent person, she didn’t do things like this. She was just so angry, so frantic that there was nothing to do that she had reacted, and _badly_. But it was his fault as well, his arrogance, the complete absence of sympathy from him.

            As if he didn’t care at all.

            She paused, pulsing her fingers into a fist to restore circulation throughout her hand and to gain a moment to gather her thoughts.

            Maybe he didn’t care after all; maybe everything they had been through together actually had been purely physical. In the end, maybe she didn’t matter to him at all. “Why won’t you help me?” she asked him softly, her light eyes hesitating before lifting to meet his dark ones.

            He tilted his head at her, dark curls falling around his temple. The scar on his face was pale, paler than usual. “Because there is no help for you,” he replied easily, his voice deep and smooth. “You’re going to die out there. In here. And I didn’t want to give you the wrong impression in the end.”

            She breathed shallowly, her body slowly falling into icy submission. “And what impression would that be?” she asked in a distracted whisper. She swallowed through a thick ball in her throat but lifted her head, attempting a brave front. He would not see her break, not now. Not ever.

            His brow furrowed as he drew close to her, the skin of his cheek still red from her slap. “That I cared for you,” he answered, his breath a caress along her temple. He exhaled quietly, his very form feigning sympathy. “I don’t. I thought I had made it clear when I shut you out but, obviously, you needed to be convinced. And now here we are, the result of your _silly_ little actions.” His words caused him to bare his teeth, his lips tightening into firm lines.

            She stared at him, her chest rising and falling erratically as if there was air to be breathed in this place, as if she could actually feel anything here.

            His hand rose and she closed her eyes defiantly as he pressed his palm to her cheek. He lifted her head and she could barely hold herself in place, her entire body shaking from the effort. His mouth brushed hers lightly, soft and almost chaste. “I don’t love you,” he whispered against her cheek, his words sending pangs through her, pain. He exhaled, breath warm against her lips, his head bowing, and the gesture caused his mouth to touch hers again. “That vision of the beach, of that night that you hope will come to pass…” He shook his head, his lips sliding against hers, much too intimate. “It won’t now. And for that I am _grateful_ that you’ve brought yourself to this point.” His words were rough against her, like sandpaper against her soft edges. “That is one choice that I won’t have to make, that you have taken from me. So thank you.”

            She heaved against his lips. Tears rose behind her closed eyelids, hot and stinging, and she hated him then, hated him from so deep inside that she hadn’t even been aware there had been such depth to her. She should never had trusted him, should never have allowed herself to _feel_ for him-

            “And now I do believe I will say goodbye.” He lowered his lips to hers once more, gently, lightly, the smallest caress.

            She accepted his kiss almost emptily, her body rigid. But as his lips left hers she realized that she wanted more in that moment, one last taste of him, one last gesture to take with her when she went. As she rose on tiptoe to return a kiss to him, he didn’t pull away though he did seem slightly startled by her actions. She inhaled deeply, taking in that trace of dark woods, the clean and perfect scent of him even though he wasn’t real or tangible.

            He held himself still against her, his lean body firm, his lips unmoving under hers. She pressed a kiss to that tight mouth and then one last one before lowering herself back down and away. As her eyes came open, she gazed at him with shimmering eyes and his face blurred behind her tears. “Goodbye, Ben,” she whispered.

            He merely looked at her, his face blank.

            And then she closed her eyes and fell away, blackness swooping in and dragging her into its warm depths.

 

            Her eyes came open, fluttering. The light was much too bright overhead and as she blinked with a grimace, she found herself staring up at light fixtures. She scowled, turning her face away.

            General Leia Organa sat at her side on a small chair, her wizened face gently breaking into a soft smile. “Welcome back.”

            She blinked at her in confusion. “Back?” she asked through a mouthful of what seemed to be cotton.

            The general slowly rose and came to her bedside, and Rey suddenly realized that she was on a cot in the medbay. She frowned down at her leaden body hidden underneath a crisp white sheet before turning to look at Leia.

            The older woman’s face shone as if the very sun hid beneath her skin.

            Rey stared at her, eyes widening.

            “My son came to me,” the general whispered to her and she beamed even as tears rose in her eyes.

            Rey blinked, suddenly feeling as if she, too, wanted to cry though she didn’t completely understand why. “I’m sorry?” she asked in confusion and her voice tightened painfully, hitching.

            Leia smiled once more, glowing, and she lifted a hand to Rey’s face. The general’s soft touch reminded Rey of Kylo Ren even though it was somehow different, lighter. “My son came to me,” she said again and the woman’s eyes searched Rey’s face. “He sent himself to me, a projection, to tell me that you were in the forest, that you had been hurt.” She trailed her palm down Rey’s face, smooth cool fingers against her warm cheek. “I sent search parties immediately but he led me directly to you and we brought you here, have been waiting for you to come back.” She paused, her eyes drifting down before coming back to meet hers. “I haven’t spoken to my son in fifteen years…and you brought him back to me. Even if it was only for mere _moments_.”

            Rey stared back at her wordlessly. Faced with the mother of the man she had come to care for, she had reason for the tears in her own eyes finally. “He’s still there,” she said to her quickly, her voice becoming frantic as she tried to explain, tried to make the woman understand. “He’s still Ben deep down, I know he is. I _feel_ him. He’s _there_ -“

            Leia shook her head over her words, shushing her. “Not now. Not now. For now you rest and recover. And then when you’re stronger, we can talk. But for now, just rest.” Her head tilted as she gazed down at Rey, as she smoothed her hair back. “And know that I am forever in your debt for giving me a glimpse of my son, of the boy that I once knew.” She shook her head as if she didn’t understand, couldn’t believe it. “He is a man now and so much has happened in these years but…his face…” The general shook her head once more, her eyes softening. “I will _always_ know his face.”

            Rey blinked at her for a long breath, her chest feeling as if it strained. Then she nodded, settling back along the bed, her heart threatening to break from such weight.

            Yes. Perhaps she had managed to reunite mother and son in the moment. However, he had made things perfectly clear to her; he was willing to let her die just to ease himself of her presence, of their supposed bond. He was willing to fracture it.

            But then…he hadn’t, had he? He had still risked himself to contact his mother as to Rey’s whereabouts, to the situation at hand.

            All his words, his haughty attitude, had been for nothing. She was alive and would soon be well. And she would be seeing him again. She laid her head down on the pillow, her eyes sliding closed. Yes, she would see him again, and shortly. She was going to make him see the light that was still hidden deep down inside of him. She was going to drag his sorry ass out of those shadows even if it was the last thing she did. And she fell back into sleep with a small smile on her face at the thought.

 

**Preview:**

_Take me. Use me-_

The invitation was unspoken but it hung in the air, in her thoughts, as he spoke them through their bond.

_-and then let me go._

 

 

           

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ugh, you guys are so awesome it breaks me to pieces. Some of these reviews are just...amazing. I love it, thank you all so much for reviews, for kind words, for kudos and for following. You make my day, you guys really do.


	9. Chapter Nine

Chapter Nine:

 

            When she saw him again, it was weeks upon weeks later and it was a dream. She distinguished it from her usual visitations; she hadn’t looked for him when she had laid her head down to sleep. This was different, unintentional though she had hoped. A dream indeed and one she would painfully and then unknowingly forget when she rose in the morning.

            He had avoided all contact with her since her rescue, had thrown up walls around himself when she had reached out, when she had poked and prodded. She would catch the slightest shifts from him, the airiest of words. He considered her a damned child when she kept at him, when she wouldn’t back down from his silence. He almost hated her when she was more forceful in her attempts to reach him, the sharp stabs she sent to him, screaming into the vast emptiness between them.

            She was going to wear him down until he acknowledged her.

            Until he came to her.

            She appeared, seated on the side of his bed now as if she belonged in the same space as him. Her head lifted, scanning the moonlight coming in through the wall-sized window of transparisteel. It was muted tonight; clouds provided cover, diluting the light. She almost imagined that she could smell the approaching rain in the air. Turning, she lowered her eyes to his sleeping form in the bed.

            He was so tall, such long pale limbs and lean smooth muscle, scars criss-crossing his skin. A white bed sheet had been dragged close and tossed haphazardly in his sleep and now only a mere corner covered what was his very naked body. She supposed he always slept nude but this was the first time she had encountered him unaware of her and she allowed her gaze to run over his figure leisurely. She would not have another moment like this, not that she knew of. Better to have a glimpse now for he would be cross when he awoke to find her waiting at his bedside. He had already seen her nude; best to enjoy the view while she had the chance.

            She tilted her head, gazing at his face as she turned her attention to it after the perusal of his striking form. Even in slumber it was drawn and tired, his brow furrowed, his black locks cushioning him beneath. She almost wanted to reach a hand out to smooth the frown away so he could sleep in peace.

            He came awake as if he had merely closed his eyes for a moment. He blinked before his gaze narrowed on her wearily. Then, slowly, he cocked his head along his pillow and met her stare head on.

            She returned his gaze. “You always know when I’m here,” she whispered, her voice airy in the night, in the darkness. She had caught him off guard tonight in this dream; it was why she was still here instead of being shoved back to her side of the galaxy, of their shared web. Her eyes trailed downward, almost a caress as she allowed her gaze to roam over the lines of his ribs and abdomen. She stared at a sliver of pale skin beneath the white sheet, where the corner barely covered his waist, and ran her eyes over a thin line of a scar there.

            What could have caused that, she wondered.

            He was fully nude, muscle etching lines into his hip and thigh as he shifted. “How?” she asked distractedly, her gaze caught to a smooth ripple along his waist as he moved his body to face her. “How do you always know? How do you always see me even when I try not to be seen?”

            He sighed, a release of breath in the stillness, his black hair curling under his cheek. “How can I not?” he asked her, his voice low and weary. His dark eyes blinked slowly, spiked lashes against pale skin. “You are the sun.”

            And the way he spoke the words caused a swell deep inside her, at the idea that he could be awed by her. She fought the urge once more to reach out, to pass her hand across his brow. Instead, her fingers drew in, clenching into a fist at her side between them.

            His eyes caught the gesture but then they merely rose to stare at her, the scar on his face silvery in the light. He was far too comfortable in the darkness, carelessly beautiful in the slant of dim cloudy moonlight that kissed the length of him. He was also at ease with his nudity, even in his dreams.

            His expression turned sly at her thought as if he had heard it, and his dark stare caught to her face before slowly trailing downward. As his gaze shifted down her frame she felt fingers; the smallest caress, the brush of his ghostly stroke along her skin. She straightened slightly, inhaling tremulously through parted lips.

            “You and I can both play this game,” he murmured through barely moving lips, his eyes flying back to hers. “I am just willing to go where you will not.”

            Her breath tangled in her lungs, gooseflesh breaking across her flesh. And as she shivered, the same caress trailed upward, sweeping in along her collarbone, reaching. “Wait-“

            He rose from his prone position, the sheet sliding down his abdomen, muscle shifting under pale skin. “More waiting,” he mused softly, his voice deep. His words were always somehow expressionless but his eyes betrayed his desire then. “Why do you continue to come to me if all you wish to do is wait?”

            She throbbed, her breath coming harder, her heart pounding. As he sat up his nearness warmed her, heat emanating from his very skin. Always hot enough to set her aflame. Dark waves of hair framed his face and as his eyes moved toward her neck where those phantom fingers still played, she was suddenly very aware of him. She could only shudder as his physical hand lifted from the bed, long fingers reaching out.

            He had once threatened her with that hand, when she had been strapped down and at his mercy in an interrogation room, when he had dug into her head and searched for a long lost map.

            His palm lowered to her chest, such heat from his skin warming her icy skin.

            How could she feel so cold in this dream?

            Those long fingers wrapped slowly around her neck, merely resting there gently. His eyes measured his own movements, seemingly drawn to his gestures as if intoxicated. And as she shook, his eyes darted upward to meet hers.

            He was beautiful, she realized again dimly, desperately. His darkness attracted her, drew her in, the way a warm blanket fought to hold their sleeping host in the night, just as deceptively comforting. It was what his kind did, the Dark Force users; they gave their wants and desires, their _temptations_ , life. Why wouldn’t she be drawn to that?

            “You always come to me like this,” he murmured, his lips barely moving. He sounded slightly bemused and his fingers played across her skin lightly. “It is…difficult to hold you off.” His eyes returned to his hand, watching as his fingers spread and trailed up and down the column of her neck. “Because I wait for moments like these no matter how hard I push you away. I never know when they’ll come, whether you will be real or a dream that I will forget in the morning.”

            She swallowed against his palm, feeling his grip ripple over her throat with the gesture. She understood his words, knew the tremor that ran below them. “I don’t mean to come here. It isn’t-“

            He cocked his head at her words and his eyes darted up to meet hers once more. “Of course it is,” he chided her. “It is exactly what you want. Exactly what you mean to do.” He hesitated, fingers trailing incessantly across her skin. “Exactly what I need,” he murmured absentmindedly and his dark gaze dropped to her throat again as if he couldn’t resist, as if he couldn’t help but watch himself touch her.

            There was the sudden flash of a vision, of him leaning in to press his mouth to her neck where his fingers rested; his tongue lapping at the hard ridge of her clavicle, his hand tightening on her jaw, fingers on her nape as he pulled her to him tightly, his dark hair against her cheek.

            Her breath hitched in response to the vision, her entire body warming, and his chest rose at her primal response, his brow lifting slightly.

            And then his hand slipped away, his heat leaving her and she finally exhaled though her breath came unsteadily. His dark eyes returned to hers, the muscles of his broad shoulders shifting as he straightened even more. “You are here nonetheless,” he said softly, his eyes intent. “It would seem the communication to my mother went heeded.”

            She fought to control her breathing, attempting to compose herself. She didn’t understand how he did it. He made it seem as if nothing fazed him while she was left half gasping and yearning. “Y-yes. Yes. She was…glad to hear from you. To see you. As I was glad that you sent warning to them that I was hurt.”

            He snorted inwardly, his chest pulsing with the mirthless laugh as he looked away.

            She tilted her head at him, her eyes searching the side of his face as he turned from her. “I didn’t think you would let me die,” she said to him carefully. “But I wasn’t sure. You were very…” she shifted uneasily. “Convincing.”

            He didn’t turn to look at her and she found that she wanted to read the expression that had clouded his face at her words, draw his thoughts from him. She leaned in the attempt, reaching.

            He didn’t afford her the luxury but he did speak and his words were slow, stilted. “I dragged you…somewhere. Somewhere I felt you would be at ease when you awakened. I had…already been to see my mother when you woke in my bedroom.”

            She recoiled at his words, confusion blossoming inside of her. But she saw it then as he fell into an uncomfortable silence, watched his actions unfold in her mind as if he had no power to stop them from rising in his own head; the terrible tremor that had vibrated down the thread tethering them to each other and the silence that had been Rey’s response when he had called out to her cautiously across the vast distance. How he had come to her through their bond and found her unconscious, unfamiliar with the terrain and location but aware that the Resistance was not far. The way he had fought with himself for mere moments before piercing the wall he had erected to hide himself from his own mother, and how he had traveled across that same expanse to see her for the first time in well over a decade. It seemed Rey was not the only one to have ever astral-walked through the force and she grasped then how he had immediately understood what she had attempted when they had first met in the bright corridors of his base, when he had spoken the Code to her and forced her to reawaken back in her physical form.

            It felt like such a long time ago now.

            He had spoken to the general without his helmet from the beginning, allowing his face to be seen by his mother after such a long time hidden away, his tone brimming with animosity even then. He had not wanted to do it and he had hated Rey for forcing his hand, the way only a petulant child would.

            But he had still done it.

            His voice had dragged Leia to the outskirts of the base, had demanded she rally a team for the search to find Rey. The general had done it without question though as the groups had come together, he had felt his mother’s eyes on him as he had first paced impatiently and then come to stand still as a wraith in the brilliant light of the suns overhead. And then he had led his mother, allowing himself to be seen only by the general as he had stormed onward past the barriers of the Resistance territory, reaching out for Rey through the shimmery tether they owned within the Force.

            He had taken the general and the rescue team deep into the forests, to the high edge of a small ravine, and he had turned his hooded head down into the gorge. She had been unconscious far below and there had already been beasts hovering close by, scenting her blood in the air, ready to converge on her. Finn, who had fought to be in the rescue party, had spotted Rey’s unconscious form below and Kylo Ren had watched his former stormtrooper race down toward her, his black-clothed figure slowly becoming rigid as FN-2187 had taken Skywalker’s lightsaber off Rey’s form and brandished it before the creatures inching near. He had observed as his trooper had shoved the creatures back with a wild, untrained swing of the saber, as the rest of the rescue party had climbed down to help him, to ward off the beasts until they had retrieved Rey’s body.

            Only when her unconscious figure had been carried up to where he’d stood, undetectable to the group, had he turned away from the scene and vanished, returning home and leaving the search party to bring Rey back to the Resistance base.

            And he had been furious with himself upon awakening in his physical body again; that he would do these things for her, that he would fall weakly at her feet time and again. He had been in such a rage, destructive enough that he had torn an interrogation room to shreds, calming only when he had been surrounded by sparking circuits, torn metal, and silence in his head at last.

            He sighed then in the darkness of the room, his scarred chest falling in the muted moonlight and his tone was nothing short of exhausted, his words overflowing with fatigue. “I needed you to understand that what I felt for you, what I _feel_ for you…” he shook his head, still avoiding her eyes. “It isn’t what you want. What either of us want.” He tilted his face away from her, dark eyes seeming to search the surface of his bed.

            Perhaps not, she reflected, but she found that she was not disappointed for she didn’t believe him. He had risked much to contact Leia Organa, to save her and to keep her safe as she recovered. She bowed her head away, nodding inwardly. Yes, she could be fine with his words, with not having her feelings reciprocated because in all honesty, she herself didn’t know what she felt. She only knew what she felt for him right then, the gratitude, the appreciation that she was still alive because of him. Twice now he had saved her or facilitated her recovery. One didn’t do that unless they felt… _something_.

            But she knew what _she_ needed, what she craved, especially now that he was here and tangible, within reach.

            She turned her head slowly, felt her gaze drop against her will, wishing to see more of him then. Wanting to see all of him, _feel_ all of him. And as the thought crossed her mind, she immediately snapped her eyes shut, unwilling to see.

            She would control herself here. She would have to-

            He laughed faintly again, mirthlessly, and he shook his head, his misery hanging in the air around them. But he finally faced her, his expression pained. She felt his heat, felt his futile exhalation as her light eyes met his dark stare. And then he seemed to make up his mind for he hesitated before leaning in toward her, breaching her space, his breath warm along her lips. “Have your fill,” he invited her as he dragged his mouth against hers. The touch was sudden but welcome, desired. His hand was upon her, curling around her neck once more and drawing her close, his frame tight. “I am not ashamed of myself.”

            _Take me. Use me-_

            The invitation was unspoken but it hung in the air, in her thoughts, as he murmured them through their bond.

            _-and then let me go._

            But as his mouth hovered over hers, the persuasive brush and the caress of faint breath, she felt a small ripple of light inside. “No,” she murmured against his lips and she felt her insides flip, fought the heat of him. He was a force even in her dreams and she couldn’t focus, couldn’t concentrate when he was so close and felt so real, so enticing. She grimaced, surrendering for the smallest moment and leaning into his kiss, feeling the lightest brush of his tongue. “No,” she whispered again. “Y-you are not ashamed of yourself. You are just unsure of yourself.”

            His mouth hesitated beside hers and at her words he withdrew another slight inch.

            She continued blindly, unwilling to open her eyes to him. If she looked at him, she was easily weakened. She would not hand him the victory no matter how weary he seemed in their war. “You are afraid that you will never measure up to _him_ , that you fall far short. And you do.” Her words were biting, rough. Almost immediately though, as soon as the words were spoken, she continued on and her tone shifted. “But that is not a bad thing, it _isn’t_. You were not meant to be dark, Ben.”

            His real name on her lips was somehow sensual even as she felt him recoil inwardly, a splash of cold water in their shared heat. She wanted to speak his name again and again, always; say it, whisper it, whimper it aloud in a quiet room as she came apart under his fingers and mouth.

            “You can return,” she said and now she leaned into him, following him as he retreated, still unwilling to open her eyes to him or to let him go. “You can return to the light. Come to me. Let it go. Let the darkness go-“

            Her words were cut off quite efficiently as his hand abruptly closed in tightly around her neck. She instinctively began to withdraw as she felt her air constrict, her passageways cutting off. She inhaled reflexively and grimaced as she found there was barely any air to take in. Her hands shot off the bed, one streaking to the sudden vise around her neck, the other to collide against his bare chest blindly.

            “Tell yourself that, over and over again,” he hissed against her mouth as he dragged her close. He was suddenly furious, the anger rolling off him in waves, threatening to take her under. He was projecting images as well, a haze of colors and blurred flashes. She saw herself the way he did then, caught in his grip as he heaved in rage. His knuckles were pale, his arm tight, muscles clenching, all sinew and strength as she fought to breathe.

            This was him. This would always be him, she realized futilely through a dim haze. He even manifested in his lightsaber; wild, erratic, too emotional and unstable.

            Her lips parted as she reached for a breath, as she felt him much too close, and she knew without seeing that her strikes were doing nothing to him. He was immovable, so much stronger than she had anticipated and every time she thought she knew his limits, he surpassed them.

            She could stop this, could awaken in her own room. This was nothing more than a dream. Nothing but a _dream_ -

            “Tell yourself how you can change me, how you can drag me out into the light. Say that long-lost name again when you try to convince yourself. Repeat it over and over,” he uttered, lips brushing her cheek, his hand so tight she thought it would break her, “until you believe it. And then come to me so I can show you the _truth_ -“

            Her eyes snapped open and her glare cut through him and his words, her hand squeezing his wrist as she darted to her knees to loom over him. His lips tightened into a line but she was tougher in that moment as adrenaline raged through her and she shifted to face him.

            “If your wish…is to kill me, to _silence_ me,” she panted in a steely soft tone, laboring under his grip as she met his dark stare head on, “then _do_ it. _End_ it…for the _both_ of us. So I can s-stop… _coming_ to you. So I can stop _reaching_ for you-” Her voice became strained all the more, her hand tightening on his wrist to try to pry him off. He was so strong even in her dreams, a black shadow exhaling fire and brimstone and she could barely breathe in his wake. She saw only Kylo Ren then, the creature the Resistance feared, the unholy knight that the First Order had cultivated. “Do it. I am not-” she squeezed her eyes shut for a moment, heaving as she held off the wave of dizziness that threatened to overwhelm her. In a moment, if he didn’t let up, she would be forced to awaken from sleep in her own bed because there was no way she was going to allow this to be the end of her. She had a duty now and she was not going to abandon it quite so easily. “I am n-not afraid. But do _not_ let your own _fear_ stop you. Nothing…stops you now except yourself. Y-you have this choice.” She attempted to inhale and realized that she had no breath left, no alternative, no recourse beyond this, and her words came almost wrathfully. “ _So make it._ ”

            As she hissed the directive, she was reminded of his words in the very beginning of their tryst; how he had comforted her as she had almost died in his arms, how he had whispered such soft calming words to her in the form of the Jedi Code that he should have long forgotten. How he had issued a command that she’d had no choice but to follow somehow.

            _Now wake up._

            His dark eyes wavered between her face and his hand. At her words, she saw his jaw clench, saw the purpose form on his face. But even as his hand tightened momentarily around her neck, stifling the last bit of breath that she had been able to access, she felt him falter with a grimace an instant later.

            She realized in that moment that he had heard his own words as well as hers for she had not attempted to shield them from him.

            His hand relaxed abruptly and she took in all the air she could muster in crushing relief, her body pulsing with life in this strange dream. His hand slid down, his fingers loosening, and she met his eyes as he lifted his dark gaze to her heaving figure.

            She stared at him, panting heavily, her body struggling to reform, to recover. But her lips mouthed words, her chest pulsing with life as she breathed freely.

            _So make it._

            Just like that, something passed between them. She saw his thoughts as they suddenly became clear to her; the beach in the night, the shuttle as it lowered to the base of the cliff. And in the same way the bond bridged them, he was witness to the way he had recoiled beside her, hidden once more behind a mask and fleeing even as his counterpart on the beach below had reached for her other self desperately; the fear and the helplessness at realizing that events were already set and shifting into place even as he fought them tooth and nail, how little control he actually had over anything in his life even though, here and now, he could make his choice.

            _That isn’t the future._

            His words were dim in her head, tremulous. He did not want it to be. And neither did she. The ways of the Jedi did not allow such ties, such sentiments. But in the cloudy moonlight, in his bedroom with the rain beginning to fall outside, she believed it could be. She could fall for him, could even love him-

            His eyes caught to hers, his hand on her chest straining. She returned his gaze directly, her heart pounding fiercely from the gift of air, and then she bowed her head, forcing the thought wide, loud in their connection. It echoed in her head, almost seemed to be pushed into the waking realm for she couldn’t voice it audibly anymore. She was dying here in his arms, in this dream, and she needed him to know, needed it to be put out into the world and become truth.

            _Yes. I can love him. I can love him more than I will ever even understand-_

            The expression that streaked across his face was almost one of release. And of aching terror. But then his hand wrapped around her neck once more, fingertips digging into the nape of her neck and he dragged her forward into a desperate kiss. She was startled to find herself there, didn’t understand how she was suddenly dying or suddenly living. But there she was in his hold, feeling his body tremble with emotions that he barely understood and ultimately did not wish to express then.

            But in the night her dreams returned to her. So many dreams that she had forgotten, that had flitted away in the early morning light. Nights and visions in which she had shared his bed, in which she had dragged him to her even when she hadn’t remembered. She was pressed against him now, his heat overwhelming her, but deep inside she was somewhere else and she had been here before. She had already been his and she hadn’t even been allowed to remember it.

            He had come to her once in another dream, summoned in the night to her room. He had paced about, looking completely out of place in her quarters for it had belonged to the Resistance base. But she assumed this was what he had experienced when she had suddenly appeared within the confines of the First Order base.

_You could have found me long ago, found your way to the new Resistance base and brought the information, its location, to your Supreme Leader._

            _Yes_ , he whispered but then he drew away from that thread of thought, returning to the dream that they had both been forced to forget in the light of dawn.

            He had bemoaned the supposed travel in that specific dream, had poked at her shrewdly in search of a spirited response. But she had not given that any reply, had instead answered his jabs by kissing him, surprising him even then. She had needed to feel him in a place where she had never been allowed to welcome him and he had responded immediately, had taken hold of her fiercely and pressed her down to her bed, had made desperate love to her in the darkness of her room. He had seemed awed by her, his hands roaming her body carefully but urgently, his mouth tracing every part of her, his arms tight in hunger. She had always hidden her true form from him, in the form of a flimsy blanket or by simply sending him away in the midst of their tryst and she was almost certain he had done the same to hide the many scars and disfigurements of his body. As if she would have cared or found him unattractive because of them. But there had been dreams where they had consummated their bond and they returned to her then, returned to him as well for he had forgotten with the bleary morning light the same way she had.

            This was why he was always so angry, why she was always so desperate. They were killing each other slowly, painfully, and _exquisitely_ , reaching for each other just after waking, bodies straining in agony for release. And she would finish the task with her fingers in the morning, feeling empty even as she had climaxed. She felt deep down that he had done the same, wrapping his fingers around his length and pumping until he had come, and it had made him all the more cross with his subordinates for he had not had her to pull close after.

            Now, in the blue moonlight, in the cool cloudiness of his bedroom, he dragged her against him violently and he spoke against her mouth. “Come to me. Come now.” And a second later, his breath tangling with hers and his hand quivering along the nape of her neck, he pleaded, “ _Please_.”

            She wanted to explain that she was already here, that she was already his. But he felt the underlying tremor of fear that she could never physically go to him. That day would mark the end of her, of her life, of their bond.

            _You should want more from me, **for** me, than just a night._

            She sensed his reluctant agreement at her thought though it broke him inside as its meaning settled over him.

            _This is why we meet on the beach, why I come to you in the middle of the night one day soon._

            She understood his faint words, the dawning realization and the ensuing fear in his kiss even though she wasn’t even sure the image of the beach was real, was in their future. Had it been a dream, a vision of what was to come? How could anyone know? But the fact that he would readily come to her when their shared visions couldn’t be trusted, that he would come to her blindly-

            His tongue parted her lips and she savored him fully; metal, wood and masculinity, then a sudden taste of frailty. Her hands lifted to his face, tangling in his black curls. Soft as if she stood with him physically in the same room, as if he were fully present. Is this how she imagined his hair or was this real? They shared a dream, she was certain of that, and they always forgot it in the morning. But here and now, his hair felt cat-like smooth, curling around her fingers as she wove them in that sea of darkness. Even as his hand left her neck, she felt his arms wind around her fully, a steely grip that pulled her flush against his hard smooth chest, a shiver streaking up the length of her spine. He made her feel wanted, needed, and _desperate_ to have her with such a strong grip.

            His hands took hold of her rear and he hefted her up and over his leg, squarely onto his lap a moment later. She felt light as a feather in his embrace, as if he could sustain her and so much more. The slight weight of her brought a low groan from him as she settled, her breath leaving her lips against his in a sigh.

            She had been here before in a long gone dream. This too could be forgotten, she knew, as this too was a dream. So long as she began to avoid him, hide away again, her visions of him would fade into darkness, even her visitations. It wouldn’t matter if she awoke bereft and trembling from his ghostly touch; she could forget one day far in the future, she knew she could. No matter how much it tore her apart to get there.

            _But you. You will hold onto these memories, I know you will. They reside in your world of darkness because I can’t hold onto them where I am. But if we meet one day on that beach…you will love me._

            His hands tightened on her figure, his frame stiff against her. He loved her now, she sensed, no matter how many words he didn’t speak or how many ways he attempted to refute it. His every breath resounded with the declaration; he just wouldn’t speak it aloud to her.

            She understood, her body arching against him, her arms reaching for more. She felt his hands drift across her lower back and her brow furrowed. This was still a dream but she could control the dream. She needed to.

            When his hands passed along her lower back again, his palms met bare skin. He broke from the kiss abruptly, eyelashes fluttering to stare up into her dark eyes in confusion. She returned the hooded gaze, her knees holding her suddenly naked body just above his lap.

            _Anything can happen in dreams. I can change this world to my liking, make you see things that I want you to see. And a girl can love a boy even as their principles tear them apart._

            As he blinked in bewilderment, she curled a hand around the back of his neck, the other lifting and brushing his dark curls from his forehead. She loved his face, she realized hazily, painfully, her heart pounding in her ears. Even the scar that she had left on him.

            Theirs was a catastrophic affair; wild, fierce and passionate. Everything she hadn’t realized she had wanted until that very moment. Everything the Code asked her to part with. She leaned down to kiss him, her lips pressing to his urgently as she thought again how much she longed for every part of him, from his perfect form to the thunderous crash of his emotions on the beaches of stillness.

            He loved everything about her, whispered the thought that came back to her. His eyes were clear and deep as she pulled back, as she met his gaze questioningly. His thoughts were a far cry from their last encounter when he had said that he had felt nothing for her, from their actions only moments earlier in fact, and she stared at him intently, wanting to rip his true feelings from him.

            He projected a flash of seeing her figure for the first time in her refresher as he had stripped her of the towel, and she had shimmered like the sun to his wide-eyed gaze. He had never seen anything more stunning and he had been startled, shaken into silence. Because how could he be with the Dark when he craved someone so Light, when the sun shone so bright in a person, when a woman was so stunning and so blinding that he couldn’t help but be drawn toward her?

            _How do I resist the light when you **are** the light? How can anyone-_

            His eyes moved to her body in his arms then, to the bare skin under his palms as he slid them slowly down her back to her hips. She pressed her mouth to his achingly, halting his gaze downward, her tongue parting his lips to taste him. He submitted under her, his arms constricting around her slender frame once more, a soft sigh falling from him. She tightened her hold as well, threatening to crush him against her and she felt that he would have gladly died then and there, so long as he remained in her embrace. She moved across his lap and a groan left his lips against hers, his lower body clenching. She dropped a hand away from his hair reluctantly, her fingers taking hold of the bed sheet between her and her lover. He shifted her across his lap to accommodate her once he understood what she wanted and then she was pressed to his hardness, aware of every part of him intimately. He wanted her, he _craved_ her, and both his thoughts and his physical body were telling her as much.

            _You can run if you need to._

            His words came hazily, lost in the back of her heavy breaths, running under the thoughts in her head. She could disappear back into her real world safely and continue to drag this affair out for as long as she needed no matter how many fits he threw, how many mornings she awoke needing him as she brought herself to release with deft fingers.

            No, she thought to him, her tongue trailing his lower lip, touching the tip of hers to his as she moaned softly. She was not fleeing this time and neither was he. She wanted him to remember this moment, all of these moments, because one day very soon she would meet him on a cold beach in the night and he would kiss her and hopefully recall what would transpire tonight. And he would love her the way she finally did him because what they felt for each other was frantic and otherworldly, desperate, but very much alive no matter how many times he disputed it aloud. Outside of whichever side they were on, whether it was the Resistance or the First Order; it was more than that, more than them.

            _Please let us remember this. Please-_

            The thought ran beneath her pants, beneath the kiss she pressed to his mouth as she reached between them below. His mouth broke from hers in a breath, his lips parting in need as she took hold of him, his hard entirety, guiding him carefully toward her. His head lowered to her shoulder, resting for a moment before rising blindly to bury against the skin of her neck as she nudged him into her, penetrating her. And then he was pushing up urgently, his hands taking hold of her hips tightly to hold her steady as he entered her slowly and then fully.

            _This is why I come here,_ she realized futilely, her mouth falling open, her eyes squeezing shut as she took all of him in. He was thick and hard, long inside of her and she felt herself aching to come apart just to take him in. _This moment now, this need I feel. It isn’t because he needs me. It’s because I need-_

            He rocked under her, his lips lifting to trail along the underside of her jaw, his hips pressed to her as he merely held her tight to him.

            _…him._

            Breathing deeply, almost painfully, he drew back and lowered his gaze to where they had merged. She rose in his arms, shifting slowly as she climbed his length, memorizing the feel of him and accommodating to fit him. His lips formed a soft circle at her movements, his eyes caught to their joining. He stilled her a moment later, his hands gripping her and then slowly lifting to trail over her waist, her ribs, up over her breasts and back down again to grasp her hips tightly. His touch was gentle, light, but the desire in his eyes spoke to his need. He wanted her and he wanted her desperately.

            _What are we going to do? What are we going to do? Where will we go-_

            The thought rang through her frantically, over and over, even as she threw her head back at the wanton feel of him, her hair drifting loosely along her spine.

            One of his hands left her hip to take hold of the back of her neck, a finger prodding her to straighten her head to face him hazily. “We’re going to be together,” he whispered to her firmly and he dragged her down into his kiss, his mouth hot and wanting.

            She exhaled into him, grasping him by the shoulder, nails digging into the sharp bone and feeling the scar there as her fingertips passed across the raised skin. And then she was moving on him, lifting along his length before lowering once more, swallowing the moan that came from him. She found that she relished having him like this, almost at her mercy. Every shift across his lap, every caress along his member had an immediate effect, the expressions on his face reflecting his need.  

            “Somehow. Somewhere-“ he uttered painfully and he shut his eyes tightly as she did it again, as she felt herself tighten around him and squeeze. His hand clenched on the back of her neck, the muscles of his arm tight and firm in the cloudy moonlight as he leaned away from her and allowed her to move on his lap, his other hand falling back to support himself on the bed.

            He seemed almost lost as she rode him, as if he couldn’t believe that she was actually in his arms. His parted lips opened further as she tensed around him in mid-rise and no one had ever looked at her, had ever wanted her the way he seemed to when his eyes came open to meet hers. She rose on him, slick, returning his gaze as that dark stare locked on her and he was breathing roughly, his body tight beneath hers.

            With courage she hadn’t known she possessed, she moved her hands to his chest and pressed down carefully. He understood after a moment and he allowed her to push him flat onto the surface of his bed, his chest rising erratically under her palms.

            He was all beautifully hard surfaces and smooth skin and she trailed fingers along the scars on his body as she straddled him, nails scratching slightly. He reacted to that especially, his teeth glinting through his lips as he inhaled and she returned her eyes to his blindly. She shifted along his length, feeling his heart beat under her touch, her hands sliding down on his ribs to support herself. He tilted his head slightly to gaze at her from his bed, patient with her as she tested the feel of him deep inside. She felt then that he was uncertain, that he didn’t want to trust her even though he was inside of her, that he was afraid to-

            His hand streaked up from his side, taking hold of her face. Her lips parted reflexively, her body tensing, but then his thumb was on her jaw, moving toward her mouth. He brought her chin down with a bit of pressure and as she opened for him, his thumb lifted to her bottom lip and trailed across its sensitive surface. A soft sigh left her and she took his thumb between her teeth for a moment, canine pinching it before it slid to the corner of her mouth.

            His chest pulsed under her palms as he inhaled harshly, as he dragged his thumb, now damp from her mouth, across her lip brusquely. Passion, _force_ , seemed to arouse him and she had been aware of that before but the small gesture reinforced it in her. She gazed down at him across the bed as she cradled him inside of her, at the way his mouth tightened into a line, the way his fingers on her hips squeezed.

            She could break him. Effortlessly. She watched the expressions that flitted across his face yearningly, suddenly feeling in that moment how powerful she was. As he breathed almost painfully, she sank down to him, rocking along his length inside of her as she bent to kiss him.

            His lips parted easily against her insistence, his hand clenching on her hips as he brought the other down to join the first possessively. The kiss turned fierce, his mouth opening under hers, his tongue sweeping hers, wanting to devour. A moan tore from her, one that turned into a gasp as he took control. His hands lifted her body to the very edge of him, fingers digging into the soft skin of her hips before he yanked her back down against him roughly. She cried out again, her lips breaking from his, her body trembling at the sensation. He did it once more without giving her a moment to recover, lifting his head and taking her mouth once more, teeth nipping viciously at her bottom lip. There was the slight sting of pain, of pleasure, her body shuddering.

            “Tell me to stop,” he uttered and the tip of his tongue swept the bit of lip that he had bitten as if to soothe it. His breath was hot, coming in pants and she couldn’t understand his words then, her body aflame. He said it once more, almost wild now, holding her tightly in his hands as he shoved deep into her again and again, pounding into her and driving her to senselessness. “Tell me to stop. _Tell me-_ “

            “Don’t stop,” she groaned and she gasped yet again, straining as he began to move in a rhythm, his hips lifting and falling under her roughly. She had dreamt of this, had dreamt of him before only to have the memory swept away by the light of dawn. Even now, caught in a lucid dream, she understood what her body needed, that she needed _him_ , but she still didn’t know him. And she wanted to. She wanted to know every inch of him, every bit-

            His hands pulled her down tightly to him, his hips moving against hers as he thrust into her and he had changed the position on her, shoving her forward on her knees and forcing her hands off him and onto the bed at either side of his head. Every movement now sent searing chills through her; the feel of him, the friction of his body against hers. Her mouth fell open mindlessly and he took advantage, his kiss aggressive, wanting. She felt a whimper escape her into his lips as he trapped her hips against his firmly and then rocked, rubbing against the most sensitive part of her. She squeezed her eyes shut tightly, unable to fight the tremors that shook her body, the shivers that traveled her spine and caused her to shudder in his grasp.

            “Let go,” he whispered against her lips and he kissed her, his tongue sweeping hers as she came open for him. He broke from her mouth even as he thrust into her, and his arms wrapped around her slender frame, biceps digging into her ribs as he clutched her to his chest tightly. His words came in pants, in a slow groan as he rose inside of her and penetrated deeply in one abrupt plunge, anchoring and then stroking languorously. “Let _go_. Let me-“ 

            Her breath came in soft cries, heat building up deep inside. A surge of sweet agony was rising and she clutched at him almost fearfully, a hand digging into his nape of black hair and latching on forcefully. She knew it was a painful grip, could feel the sharp ache through their connection but it was offset by the ripples of desire radiating off him like a cresting inferno. He loved every twinge of pain, every bruise she left on him, the way she clutched at him as she bucked to meet him. His hard thrusts shoved her across his lean frame repeatedly, her breasts crushed against his chest and he took hold of her face, dragging it up. His mouth was hungry on hers, wet and ferocious, impatient. She tried to return the kiss, attempted to clear her head of the haze but she couldn’t; she couldn’t see anything past the light that was just on the horizon, the trembling ache that was building below. She needed it, needed the release, needed the throbbing to stop. “Please,” she pleaded against his mouth as he kissed her, her voice low and wanting, her body demanding him even as she quivered around him. “ _Please_ -“

            “Yes,” he uttered instinctively, his tone low and deep, just as desperate. “ _Yes_. Just stay with me. Stay with me-” A pause, a slow groan along her lips as his chest lifted against her in yearning, as he pushed into her in a senseless rhythm. “Come to me-“

            Even at his plea she was curling, her body tensing around him. A growl broke from him as she tightened, as she strained and threatened to end them both. She could feel that he would die in her arms then, that it could be the only way to go, here and now. Not in battle, not in combat, but here in the arms of the woman that he loved-

            She broke away from his mouth abruptly, streaking off him to stare down in shock. He panted beneath her, still moving inside of her in frenzied thrusts, his hair black against his light sheets, in the pale light of the rainy night, and he was _stunning_.

            She trembled from the throbbing, from the ache that was burning deep inside, from the very essence of him. She couldn’t focus through her need but she had heard his thoughts, had felt them ripple through her and even now as she moved along his slick hardness she was overflowing with emotion. It was too much, _too much_ , and she shut her eyes almost in pain, her hips moving over his as she met each of his thrusts.

            “Come for me,” he whispered this time and his words were soft but they hung in the stillness of his quarters, his hands sliding across the tender skin of her back. One palm slipped along her torso to trail over her breast and his touch was more than she could take. Her head dropped back along her spine yearningly, her own fingers lifting to cover his, to press his palm to her breast tightly as he pleaded hoarsely, _“Come for me-“_

            At his words she broke, light blinding her as she came apart. A trembling cry left her mouth, resounding in the room as her climax took her over. Her body stiffened and he was just as unyielding beneath her, his thrusts still deep and rhythmic as he helped her ride out her orgasm. Her entire body seemed to liquefy, a brilliant heat consuming her as she felt the waves of ecstasy flow through her. She throbbed, her hand on his chest, and she blindly dragged it over his skin, nails digging in and trailing as the ripples of her climax washed over her.

            His eyes squeezed shut at the sting and she felt him pulse and then suddenly peak as well beneath her, his body becoming rigid, a heat spreading deep inside of her. His head fell back hard against the bed, his chest tightening as his fingers dug into the tender skin of her hip and breast, and the long dragging groan that left his mouth was enough to set her aflame. She moved along his length slowly then, lifting and sliding back down, dragging every bit of his release from him as he called her name almost painfully. She drew the shudders from him, his quivering body shaking as he thrust into her slowly, languidly.

            He whispered something under his breath in the chaos of their shared climax. But as she came back to herself with a racing heart and weak limbs, as she brought her head down to look at him, the thought seemed to flit away.

            His eyes came open, his body finally spent beneath her. She shifted across his lap, finding him still trapped deep inside of her and his eyes closed once more, his lips parting almost agonizingly as he grimaced. It was sensitive for him, she knew, as sensitive as it was for her but the feel of him was much too perfect for her to release him just yet.

            Then he spoke again and she wondered if those had been his initial words, if he had asked it of her before.

            “Don’t go tonight.”

            She tightened around him, feeling those last shivers trail through her frame.

            He settled shakily, his limbs weary. But his hands on her were firm, his caress pained as he breathed. She bowed her head, gazing at him, and he was lost in her then, his eyes unfocused. She sank down, her body resting against his hard form and he exhaled in a lingering sigh at the feel of her, his arms winding around her body weakly. “Don’t go tonight,” he whispered along her jaw again, his touch light but yearning as he tried to drag her lips to his mouth.

            She raised a hand to his cheek, feeling just as frail in his embrace. His eyes struggled to remain open but she understood because she was suddenly just as tired. His eyes closed easily against her touch, his breathing hitching before settling in a sigh and in that moment he was himself, or what she thought of as him, as his true self. His brow was smooth, his hands gentle on her body, his heart as open as his mind was to her then. 

            As if drugged, his thoughts came hazily, half conscious, words and emotion hanging heavily in their web.

            He loved her, deeply and with every part of himself, for she was light and warmth and she could bring the change he had always needed within himself.

            He hated her, thoroughly and painfully, for making him question everything he had believed for half his life and for making him choose something besides raw emotion and temptation though all she ever did was entice him.

            But she was gaining, taking him over, making him want to follow her into her grayed version of the light even with all the wrongs he had committed and all the sins that still reached for his hide. And the mere thought of that course made his other thoughts immediately flitter about in a frenzy, desperate and uncertain. It was revealed on his face, causing him to frown and grimace when only moments ago he had been calm.

            _Weak,_ came his voice faintly.

            _No. Not weak,_ she thought to him fiercely and she palmed his face, pressed a kiss to his mouth with emotion threatening to boil over and become tears in her eyes. _Not weak. Never weak. I have never seen you that way and you were just a child when this all began. No. No. Never weak._

            His respiration leveled off at her soft words in his head as if they had served to soothe him, his frown making a brief appearance again before easing, his arms loosening around her.

            She gazed at his peaceful face as he fell away into sleep in this dream they shared. That he would leave himself open to her at his most vulnerable spoke volumes and she felt her expression soften even more, almost crumbling. She couldn’t help herself; she ran her fingers down the lines of his cheek, trembling. Her heart threatened to break as she merely gazed at him, as she tilted her head and breathed him in, her eyes fluttering shut. The scent of metal, of his helm against his skin as if he wore it still. The woods of Takodana, the woods outside his very window, the forest outside the Resistance base where he had saved her yet again only weeks before. His own masculine scent and the scent they created together with their need for each other as it hovered in his quarters.

            Snapping back as she attempted to compose herself, she carefully extricated herself from him, feeling him slip from between her thighs lazily and still shuddering as shivers passed through her delicately.

            She would need the feel of him, she realized with an almost deceptive calm. Here. Now. Always.

            His breath caught as he fell free of her. His embrace tightened around her instinctively in his dream as she stretched out beside him on his bed, her arms wrapping around his lean waist and taking hold. He was all muscle and soft skin, the raised flesh of his scars registering under her sensitive fingertips.

            He was peaceful in sleep this time, his brow light, and she passed her palm over it then, finally reveling in the ability to do so. His skin was smooth, his expression boyish in its innocence. The quirk at the corner of her mouth struggled to form and in the end it did not as she merely gazed at him.

            There was a very good chance he would not be this person in the morning or the next time they met. He would not be the restoration, the resurgence, of Ben Solo. He would likely still be Kylo Ren. But in this moment now, before she woke from their shared dream, she wanted to think this of him and not worry that the next day would make an enemy of him yet again.

            Her name came from his lips in his slumber and she passed a thumb along his mouth, her lips parting in yearning before she closed her eyes and burrowed into his side, further into his arms. His embrace tightened, a soft sigh escaping him as he turned along the bed to drag her close. Then she slipped away into the darkness of sleep at his side, very much aware that she would never care for another man the way she did him.

 

            She snapped awake. The feel of him, the wave in his hair and the smoothness of his skin under her fingers, disappeared as she opened her eyes to the dawning sun. The mere brilliance was warm but harsh then. And the realization that it had been a dream, that he was still so _far_ from her, brought a pain to her chest, her breath constricting.

            Then the loneliness came in a wave of an onslaught, strong, gripping, _unbearable_ , and she felt her face crumble as she began to weep, her heart breaking in the morning light.

 

**Preview:**

She was going to die here, she realized dimly, a moan sliding out between her lips. She was going to die here and she was going to go willingly.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This fic just became fully explicit!!
> 
> And thank you all for the comments! UGH you all make my heart swell, I swear you do. I hope you all enjoy this chapter!!


	10. Chapter Ten

Chapter Ten:

 

            She remembered the dream. Vividly. And she felt in the darkness surrounding him so far away that he did as well.

 

            When she visited him for the last time, she was sure to appear in the dead of night to him, to force herself into the darkness of his quarters. He was nearby but he wasn’t physically in his dwelling and she moved through his main room toward his bedroom, hovering just at the doorway. Tilting her head, she gazed down at the cool sheets, the pale shade of them and then the soft moonlight through the large window that brought the entire room into blue relief. She knew this place through him, remembered the climaxes she had reached because of him in this room. The bed especially. Even as she looked at it she saw him coming rigid, saw herself straddling his figure and throbbing with aching relief.

            Such visions. Such painful visions.

            And this was his home, she realized, her heart beating bleakly. He would never leave it and she would never be able to come to him any other way than the ways she did now. She didn’t know how else to be with him except in hazy shadows and subdued moonlight. And wasn’t that just what they were? The pale darkness and the leaden glow of the moon?

            _Gray,_ a voice whispered in her heart, caressing her thoughts.

            The door to his quarters slid open and she spun at the sound, her heart pounding at seeing his tall, lean figure silhouetted in the light from the corridor. He seemed to breathe hard, his broad shoulders lifting and falling erratically. As she turned to face him fully from his bedroom doorway, he entered his main quarters, the door hissing shut behind his imposing frame. He didn’t slow, his hands lifting as he stormed across the room toward her and his fingers pressed the release to the helmet. He lifted it from his head, black waves curling along his temples as his face was exposed and he pitched the helmet aside blindly on his way to her. It impacted roughly against the far wall and bounced from the force he had used to toss it.

            For a moment she was afraid, frightened by the darkness on his face, the apparent anger in his step. She jumped at the way he had flung his helmet, at the way he stormed toward her now. She wasn’t armed, hadn’t thought this was where they stood with each other-

            But as he reached her, he took her into his arms, his lips coming down on hers roughly and she found herself dragged into his chest. Her head fell back under his demanding mouth and a second later his hands slid down to her rear. He lifted her in one swift movement and she was in his embrace, long legs wrapping around his waist, crushed against him as he continued to move, heading toward the bed without speaking.

            This was the farthest they had ever gone awake, she thought hazily, her lips parting under his as he pressed for more, his tongue sweeping her mouth demandingly. A sigh left her at his inexplicable familiarity, at the very feel of him in her arms. She knew him from dreams, from the hazy world between imaginings and wakefulness and this was him here, now, exactly as she always remembered him.

            He paused at the foot of his bed and only then seemed to slow, his hands slipping around her waist and rear. Moving unhurriedly, he lifted a knee to the bed and then cautiously leaned over, depositing her onto it. She went carefully, sliding from his arms onto the soft surface and he merely gazed at her for a long moment as her light eyes came open to look up at him, taking in his pale skin and black waves of hair. “I felt you,” he murmured, his breath warm and uneven on her face, his dark stare shifting down to her lips as if drawn powerlessly. “From the console room, I felt you come to me and I needed to see you, I needed to be here-“

            She rose up off his bed and cut him off, pressing her lips to his. She understood. There had been moments before, in the very beginning, when he had called to her as well and though she had resisted, it had been a battle to retain any kind of focus, to continue with her training and meditations. He had always attempted to interrupt her at the worst times. But to know that he had cut everything, anything that he had been in the middle of, to come to her like this-

            “I need you,” he whispered into her mouth, his lips brushing hers as he spoke, as he breathed her in and then pressed his forehead to hers in desperation. A groan left him, distressed, yearning, and he settled onto her, his weight bringing a small sigh from her. His hips pressed into hers almost cruelly and she felt his hardness through their layers and hated every barrier between them. He was speaking still, almost feverish, his mouth grazing hers with every word, and it was going to drive her mad. “I need you more than I understand. More than I can-“

            She returned the kiss to him, her tongue insisting he open to her, her pelvis surging upward into his. The sound that left his mouth at her urging caused her to shift even more, to press into him and to rock just to draw the sound again, to swallow his helpless moan. They had been here before, had tempted each other already, but tonight she needed him the way she needed to breathe. It was instinctual, primal. Vital.

            Did he remember the other dreams, have an inkling of them the way she did? They had begun to resurface after the dream they had shared most recently, the dream that still sent shivers through her and immobilized her deliciously at the worse times. Did he remember the feel of her as she did him? Because in that moment she craved him hungrily, desperately, and she suddenly found that she didn’t have time to make him recall the small snippets of visions, the feel of her hand along his smooth sensitive skin, the rhythmic flow of her curves under his hard edges.

            He recoiled as she sat up on the bed, as she began to strip herself of her clothes for him. He watched her, dark eyes fixed on her face and then to her movements, almost uncertain. His lips parted as she tossed aside her belt, removed her over shirt, removed the under shirt. And when she was down to the bands that were fastened around her breasts, down to her trousers, she reached for him, fingers demanding in her search. She wanted him nude with her, his pale perfect skin to her tanned tone, and she was shoving the overcoat off his shoulders and over his head of dark waves, tugging at his belt. He was jarred as she moved, her nimble fingers disrobing him until he was left with only the undershirt and his trousers. Even then she was insistent, dragging him in for one long, yearning kiss before breaking away and dragging at his remaining clothes. And then he was naked from the waist up, his pale skin scarred and beautiful in the gray light, smooth under the pads of her fingertips.

            She slowed to a stop, searching his body for the healed welts. This was different from her dreams of him. He had obviously hidden most of these scars from her just as she had shifted his perception of her body as well.

            But he was _stunning_ , every part of him, and her heart couldn’t contain the emotion she felt then, her entire form breathless. She raised her wide eyes to his face, her chest lifting as she inhaled unsteadily.

            He had lifted his hands to grasp her wrists from beneath and now he watched her with parted lips, his expression tentative. She heard his thoughts then, the slightest glimmer of them and he was hesitant of her, almost apprehensive of what she thought of the numerous scars that he considered disfigurements.

            But she loved them all, wanted the story behind each and every one of them, even if their details broke her to hear. She would have to learn to steel her heart against the pain but open it to compassion and the consequences that would surely follow.

            _I need to learn to accept every single thing about him, the love and the hate. The pain with the pleasure._

            The light with the dark.

            She lowered her eyes back down to the scars crossing his torso, the pale older ones and the recent darker ones. She wanted to lean in and press her mouth to every bit of raised skin, brush her cheek against them lightly. She knew she had left the two large scars on his body besides the slender one that crossed his face; the long one across his leg and the jagged streak along his shoulder, both inflicted with Luke’s lightsaber. He had staggered back when she had caught him across the leg and she still remembered the battle, felt the adrenaline that had run through her during that snowy night on StarKiller.

            This was who they were in the end, she understood.

            He stilled her hands as she dragged them down along his abdomen and toward his trousers. “Turn around,” he murmured into her ear and as she recoiled to look at him, he merely returned her gaze expressionlessly.

            Reaching out, he took hold of her and urged her over onto her stomach and elbows, a hand pressing into the arch of her back as she raised it to him in confusion. He bowed against her, hesitating as he ran a hand along her spine and then down over the curve of her.

            She felt every part of him as she arced backward almost impatiently against his slim frame, as she lifted her head to look at him over her shoulder.

            Leaning down low, his lips brushed against her ear as he said, “Trust me. For once in your life.”

            She did trust him, she realized then. She had begun to trust him and she didn’t even know when it had happened. Perhaps when he had saved her life, jarring her awake in her own body when he could have very well left her to die out in that brightly lit corridor from a blaster shot. Or even when she had overexerted herself in the forest. Turning to face forward again, she allowed the tension in her arms to fall away, her eyes slipping closed as she left herself in his arms.

            “I know the taste of you, the feel of you, as if I’ve already bedded you,” he said softly against her neck, his tongue drifting across that sensitive spot that she had only discovered because of him. He tested it again then, a soft sound escaping him as her breathing quickened, as she gripped his bed sheets in tight fistfuls. His hands slowly wrapped around her hips, kneading the soft skin, almost engulfing the entire width of her waist. As she curved languorously, he yanked her backward against his hard frame roughly, causing her lips to part at the force. “You’ve come to me and tormented me in dreams that I can barely remember, in visitations that I have to reach for.”

            She knew it. There had been moments when she had gone out seeking him, reaching for him to soothe the ache she had felt between her thighs. She had wanted him plainly, had known that he would give her what her body had begged for and he had done so without complaint, quite willingly, even if they hadn’t been allowed to remember it.

            With the fleeting thought she suddenly realized that he had heard her words in his own head, that he now knew it as well. His fingers tightened on her hips imperceptibly before loosening, dragging up over the bindings of her torso. Slowly, he began to rid her breasts of the bands, unwinding them. She waited, her back arching upward, her head falling low. She knew what would come of this, what he wanted. What _she_ wanted. She just didn’t know if she could measure up to her dreams, if he would still want her knowing her the way he was about to.

            “Loosen your hair for me,” he asked of her softly.

            She turned her head slightly toward him though she didn’t meet his eyes. Then she lifted a hand off the bed and untied the three bands, one after the other until the locks fell free.

            He slowed and a moment later she felt his hand in her hair, fingers trailing through it, his palm brushing along the side of her neck and causing her to shiver weakly. He knew when to be rough, when to be gentle; such a conflicting combination in a person. She exhaled as he released her hair, as he swooped low across her back to press his mouth to the nape of her neck in one single soft kiss.

            The gesture somehow brought her heart to swell painfully, summoned tears to her eyes. She stared forward in blind confusion until her vision strained and then she shut them tightly, unwilling to let the tears fall free.

            His hand slowly released the bindings in the midst of undoing them. A moment later his arms tentatively curled around her waist, lightly prodding her to straighten up on her knees. She rose, settling back weakly against his chest, his skin warm beneath hers as he embraced her gently then tightly.

            “I can feel you, your anxiety,” he whispered against her hair, his chin resting along her cheekbone.

            The tears threatened to brim over. “I don’t know what I’m doing,” she uttered, her voice thick and shaky. “What _we’re_ doing. I don’t know why I keep coming here when we both know that nothing is going to change. That nothing is _ever_ going to change and we’re going to repeat this over and over and it’s going to _kill_ me-“

            His voice shushed her. “Stop. Stop. Everything has already changed,” he murmured over her words, his arms warm and compassionate. “Maybe you don’t think anything has, but you have already changed me.” He exhaled, his breath warm on her cheek and he ducked his head, his dark waves curling at the corner of her vision. He was such a living contrast that she didn’t even know what to do with herself. She tilted her head into his, a tear finally trailing down her cheek, and his arms tightened around her once more. “I don’t know,” he said quietly, hesitantly, “that anything can come from what we have. I only know that the day you cease visiting me like this, or in my dreams…” He shook his head against her, his voice lowering faintly. “Make sure you kill me before you go that last time.”

            She closed her eyes again, her face crumbling at his words and her head tipped down toward her chest.

            He pulled her flush against him, his arms so tight that she was sure he could steal the breath right out of her. He had been able to do it with mere words, after all.

            _Is this real? Any of it? Are these tears even real? How do I know?_

            A hand lifted away from her ribs, long fingers brushing at her tear tracks. “They feel real, right now, right here. Just as we do,” he murmured and he held a finger out, the tip wet in the blue moonlight. “See?”

            _Yes_ , she nodded, her eyes coming open to gaze at that perfect drop on his fingertip, her mouth quivering even as she pressed her lips together tightly. Yes. They felt real. She just wanted them to _be_ real, to be more than just a figment of her imagination, of her dreams. As he had just said, they felt real, here and now. But what happened when she resurfaced in her own body, when she left him tonight?

            How many times would she have to leave him before the day came when she just…wouldn’t?

            Light. Dark. _Gray_.

            He didn’t say anything for a while, long enough that her tears dried and her sniffling faded away. He held her the entire time, his arms so warm and strong that in the moment she felt nothing would hurt her ever again.

            With the thought she realized that they could be invincible against anything that would ever wish to harm them or pull them apart. She had already accessed his skills before; she had been one with him, his equal on that snowy night on Starkiller Base when she had brought him to his knees with his own expertise because of their dawning Force bond.

            And he had accessed her strength and will, her patience and light, she realized then; he had been using it this entire time to temper himself when all he had wanted to do, again and again, was lash out and destroy everything in his path at not having her, at being denied what he had needed. In fact, she saw now that he had been using her in other parts of his duties, things that she had not been partial to, things that made sense now for she had felt the pull and had been confused by it in her trainings; everyday decisions he had made for the First Order and for his Knights, his interactions with General Hux and Captain Phasma. His dealings with the Supreme Leader.

            And Snoke was slowly becoming aware of it. 

            “Meet me,” he said quietly then, desperately for he knew his time was running out, and she stopped breathing at his words, at how he asked it of her. “Meet me. On a beach. In the middle of the night. Find the beach from your vision and I will _meet_ you there-“

            She heaved as he spoke, as she realized what had just transpired, what he had just given himself over to even if he didn’t yet understand.

            It was no longer _, “Come to me.”_ No longer a cost on her part alone. It was a sacrifice for the both of them, a meeting in the middle. A joining of their halves to become something more, something that was equal parts of them and something so much stronger with them united.

            They would only ever be able to truly hurt each other themselves, she understood, whispered to herself almost monotonously. They had become each other’s weakness even when together they were invincible.

            _There is no Light or Dark here anymore,_ she whispered to him through their connection, feeling him vibrate beside her, feeling his arms shift around her.

            _There is only Gray._

            “Meet me,” he said again, his voice low, his words soft in his deep tone. The sheer sound of him made her weak; she didn’t know how she had held out so long against him when he made her tremble with mere words.

            Her entire body stopped though, fearful in the moment as she attempted to resolve the consequences of their actions. “No,” she uttered hazily, her heart freezing up, and she turned her head toward him, inadvertently brushing her temple against his lips as she understood how abrupt she had been. “No.” At his silence, she shifted to look at him over her shoulder.

            His face had paled, his skin almost ashen, and there was a look in his eyes that she could only describe as devastation.

            She immediately turned along the bed to face him fully, kneeling before his rigid figure. Her hands streaked up to grasp his face, her grip tight on the hard planes of his cheeks and jaw. “You can’t leave this place,” she said to him painfully, her light eyes wide. “This is the only home you know. You would be leaving everything behind. _Everything_.” And she stared at him, shaking her head in distress. “And for _what_?”

            He gazed at her then as if he didn’t understand how she didn’t know. “For you,” he stated in a faint breath, his brow drawing low, his face hardening with the words. And as she attempted to recoil in surprise he dragged her back toward him forcibly. “I would be leaving it for you,” he said to her fiercely and his grip was tight, his expression breaking.

            She returned the stare to him, half fearful, half hopeful. Always frightened and now anxious for the both of them when the only person she had ever looked out for had been herself.

            _But where would we go? How would we ever survive?_

            Because she already knew that if she devoted herself to him she would have to leave her training behind. She would never be able to devote herself fully to the Jedi, not with the way she felt for him. And not with the way she had begun to feel about herself; not so much Light but not of the Dark. It was why her training with Luke hadn’t progressed enough, why he had gone so slow with her. She was not meant to be a Jedi knight.

            What was she?

            _I am nobody-_

            _Gray_ , came the voice again, not hers, delicate, fluid in the ether that she had come to recognize as the Force; always present and always just below the surface of everything she felt and everything she considered natural.

            And what was he?

            She gazed at him, her hands almost cramping on his face as she asked it of him, of herself.

            He was every part of her; her breath, her strength, her life, she realized dimly, futilely. She would never again be able to give him up now that she’d had a taste of him.

            His frown eased as he gazed at her and she understood that he had taken every single thought right out of her head. The tightness slipped away from his face and he suddenly seemed dejected. “I will do whatever it is that you need me to do,” he said to her, his dark eyes somehow light then. He closed those eyes and bowed his head in her hands, his black curls slipping around his temples and falling over her fingers. “Just tell me what to do.”

            She tilted her head, her fingertips tightening on his face. “I can’t tell you what to do,” she whispered. “ _I_ don’t know what to do. I just know what I feel for you and it’s…it’s more than I was ever prepared for.” She exhaled, her breath tousling his dark waves lightly. “I know what I feel and what I want. And it’s you.”

            He exhaled as well, his shoulders falling wearily against her but she was certain there was a measure of relief in the gesture and she felt a small smile light her face. Urging him to lift his head, she leaned in and pressed her lips to his, a brush of a kiss and then one more, gentle. He returned the second kiss, the small touch of his mouth to hers and then he straightened, looking down at her from such a height.

            “I don’t know…how this happened,” he said to her, his eyes narrowing. “But I am thankful that it did.”

            This time she allowed the smile to come alive. “Me, too,” she replied. And she raised herself up onto her knees, kissing him firmly.

            He took the kiss and then returned it after a hesitation, his mouth opening against hers. His tongue brushed hers, his lips claiming her and she sighed into the caress, her arms lifting to wind around his neck and shoulders. His own arms wrapped around her, enveloping her, a palm trailing up her back to drag her flush against his chest.

            His thoughts came to her, faint and overwhelmed. Her easy grin had taken him off guard only a moment before, had frozen him in her arms. He didn’t know how to take a smile, hadn’t smiled himself in so long that he couldn’t remember. But he had cherished the expression on her face, how bright she had been, how carefree she had made him feel with the simple act. How easily she had broken him only to offer his pieces to the Light. 

            She shook her head against his even though he sensed that she didn’t want to part from him. “Wait. Wait,” she whispered and she drew back slightly, her arms hanging limp around his broad shoulders. “Undress me. Take the bindings off-“

            He cut her off with another kiss, already moving to do as she asked. His arms uncoiled, leaving her bereft of his warmth but his hands undid the bindings from her torso until she was half naked before him. He drew away from her, his dark eyes dropping and she felt a flush crawl over her cheeks as he merely gazed at her.

            “You’re staring,” she stated uncomfortably, her skin rising in gooseflesh as she stopped from lifting her arms to hide herself. There was nothing wrong with her, no reason to hide, she told herself quietly, tentatively. But it had always fallen on deaf ears, had always made her feel more insecure than reassuring.

            “And you’re beautiful,” he returned immediately, his eyes darting up to meet hers, his stare direct and steady.

            She looked back at him in surprise, her stare dropping to his mouth before meeting his eyes again.

            His gaze was fixed on her, his face firm. “You were beautiful the first time I laid eyes on you and you are now.” And his voice came softly, reverently. “You shine like the sun.”

            Her brow lifted at his words, a breath leaving her in relief, and he tilted his head at her in confusion.

            “Why would you think you were anything less?” he asked her, his dark eyes puzzled.

            She stared at him for a moment longer before merely shaking her head. “It doesn’t matter,” she said then and she reached out for his trousers, her fingers trembling. “It doesn’t matter.”

            _I am nobody._

            “It matters to me,” he stated and he stopped her hands, fingers wrapping around her wrists. As she looked at him in defeat he said, “You don’t have to tell me now. But you have nothing to be ashamed of. You are beautiful. You always have been, from the very first moment I saw you in the forests of Takodana.”

            She merely stood in his grasp, feeling much too exposed kneeling before him. As he gazed at her she leaned forward, her mouth brushing his gingerly, softly. “I…didn’t feel the same for you that day,” she admitted softly. “I was afraid of you, afraid of the knight the First Order had sent. But I felt it when you showed me your face. Even as you tried to take my thoughts from me, I felt…something.” She swallowed, gazing at him, and he dropped his eyes away at her words but she leaned to capture them again. “I saw something in you then and I…I fought you, I did. But right now…I’ve realized it was inevitable.”

            _We were always going to come here._

            He didn’t respond to that, his expression pained.

            With a small breath, she drew close to him, a hand rising to his face. “Tell me what you want,” she whispered against his mouth and she brushed her lips along his, her eyelashes fluttering as she lowered her gaze to his bottom lip. “Tell me-“

            “You,” he uttered futilely, cutting her off as he pressed his lips to hers. “You. I want you.”

            She exhaled against him, her hands taking hold of his jaw, fingers digging into his thick hair.

            _Yes. Then yes._

            His arms lifting to wrap around her slender frame, he dragged her up against his hard body before lowering her backward down to the bed. She slipped from his embrace, her fingers still grasping his face as she settled comfortably on the soft surface.

            One of his hands lifted toward her neck, fingers spreading before slowly trailing down her chest to a bared breast. Her lips parted, her light eyes caught to his face as he looked from her down to his hand caressing her. His fingers were soft, his thumb tracing the curve of her breast as his index finger slid along a taut nipple. She was going to come apart just from the expression on his face if he continued to merely touch her- 

            He leaned down into her and a moment later she felt the soft pad of his tongue on her, his hand slipping around her arm and toward her back. She jumped in surprise and then her eyes closed as he drew her nipple into the warmth of his mouth, pulling on her and sweeping his tongue against the tender skin. She instinctively dug her fingers into his hair roughly, her hold tightening, and he moaned faintly, exerting pressure on her breast as he trailed his tongue over the soft curve. His other hand drifted upward to pay her other breast the attention it deserved as his tongue worked the nipple he had already claimed.

            She felt herself shift along the bed, her body settling under his caress. Her eyes squeezed shut as he trailed his hands over her, as he rose across her body, leanly muscled frame sliding exquisitely along hers. She could shatter under him, she knew she could, and she felt her voice leave her in a soft whimper as she lowered her hands from his hair to dig her nails painfully into his back.

            He stiffened, his jaw opening around her breast as he inhaled harshly and then he was fierce. She gasped as his mouth closed around her nipple tightly, as he sucked almost angrily and she arched off the bed, her hips pushing up off the bed into his chest.

            His hands streaked out, taking hold of her hips in a tight grip and pushing them back down into the bed as he concentrated on her breast, his tongue lapping at her before breaking off and shifting to the other nipple.

            She was going to die here, she realized dimly, a moan sliding out between her lips. She was going to die here and she was going to go willingly-

            He rose away from her, the movement causing her nails to drag up across his back and shoulders as he pulled out of reach. His lips were parted, his breath leaving him almost in pants as he lifted his hands to her waist. Her eyes came open, looking at him dimly but he was taking hold of her trousers and pulling at them roughly.

            Words left her lips incoherently, her body refusing to cooperate as he rid her of her pants. The moment she was free of them he yanked her naked body down across the surface of the bed toward him. She went hazily, craving him senselessly, her entire figure almost feverish.

            His hands took hold of her wrists and she twisted as he forced her arms to the bed above her head, pinning her down. She instinctively writhed, her arms pulling, her body arching up off the bed toward him. He released a wrist, his hand lowering beneath her field of vision but she knew then what he was doing, what was about to happen, and she realized that she wanted it, that she wanted him. All of him. She shifted wantonly, the very core of her beating and she felt a soft sigh leave her as he shifted, as he pushed her knees apart with a firm hand.

            She remembered what he felt like vividly, having caught snippets of her dreams and securing them deep inside like treasure.

            Now as he leaned over her, she straightened her legs and caught him around the waist, gripping him close and she inhaled as she felt him press against her below. His fingers were deft along her center and she felt a whimper leave her lips, long and drawn out.

            _Yes. Yes. Please, yes-_

            He entered her carefully, his width encountering her tightness.

            Her eyes came open and he raised his head to her at the same time, his expression one of restrained need. As she stared at him mindlessly he dropped his eyes back down and edged forward, his fingers pulsing along the very core of her.

            She felt him push into her slowly, his hand working at her simultaneously, and she let her head fall back at the sensation, at his slick fingers on her. She could feel his tension, could feel his desperate desire for her through their connection but even now he was tempering himself, easing into her, and she didn’t understand what she felt; a stinging pain at his intrusion, a throbbing need under his fingers even though she was already wet from her need for him, helping him slide into her. A craving so powerful that it threatened to double her in half.

            An emotion that she was scared to call love, her body seizing as he finally slid into her to the hilt. She arched off the bed, her pinned arm resisting, her free hand taking hold of the bed sheet and digging in. She had never felt as complete as she did then but it was still somehow such an alien feeling, that it would be him of all people and yet, how could it not be him?

            He caught her shifting form, his arm winding around her waist fully and supporting her, his hand releasing her wrist to push down into the bed at her side instead.

            Opening her eyes with effort, she looked at him hazily.

            He stared down at her, his dark gaze hesitant, his body straining as he held himself still. “Say something to me,” he whispered to her, his face pale, his dark curls falling across his forehead.

            She closed her eyes in agony, her chest heaving, and then she said it, spoke the words that she had been afraid to even think of earlier because in the moment it was true and she was blind to everything outside of what they had between themselves.

            “I love you. I love you,” she murmured despairingly, her body falling weakly from the curve of his arm.

            His brow cleared, his eyes widening at her words. But even as she panted heavily across his bed, he remained wordless, his gaze dropping sightlessly to her body in his arms.

            She didn’t care then. She had said what she had needed to say and now she needed to reach her peak, her body craving him almost painfully.

            He seemed to hear her then, attuned to her yearning. Arching over her, he lowered her to the bed slowly and then withdrew from her, a groan sliding from him as her body clung to him tightly. Clenching his eyes shut, he dragged himself back until he was just barely inside of her and then he pumped his hips forward, pushing into her once more.

            She cried out at the sensation, her hands reaching for something instinctively, latching onto the bed sheets, clawing into his pillow.

            She was beautiful and there was a pain deep inside of him at the realization. She felt it a moment later, read the thoughts from him as if he were a book. She lifted her head, her light eyes searching his feverishly for an answer, for some sign from him because she had never thought she was beautiful, had never thought she was worth anything.

            But then he was moving, drawing back and thrusting deep into her and she felt complete, felt the shivers that ran down his spine as her wetness claimed him and gripped him.

            Her arms lifted from the bed, her hands streaking up to take hold of his face. He was caught in her grasp, his shoulders hard under her arms as he hesitated in her grasp. His eyes were pained and his lips parted around his heaving breaths at what he seemed to read from her face.

            “Please. Please,” she said to him softly.

            His frown eased at her plea and he leaned over her, caught deep inside of her. With a tense jaw, he withdrew from her and then plunged back in, causing her to jerk in his arms. He did it again, his hips shoving into hers as he began to move, thrusting into her slickness and panting as her tightness squeezed him almost painfully.

            His thoughts were loud, his mind an open book. She felt so good, so tight; he wouldn’t last long like this, not feeling the way he did for her and the things she made him feel-

            She rose from the bed into his chest, a hand streaking up to take hold of the back of his neck. He found her lips hovering before his and he went for her blindly, his kiss hot and wanting. She returned the need, her tongue pushing at his as he thrust into her over and over, as he groaned into her mouth.

            “Come for me,” she whispered hoarsely against his lips and he drew back for a moment, recognizing the words. He remembered saying them to her as he had made love to her once upon a dream, as he had thrust into her warm and willing body and even now she was so tight that he could shatter inside of her at any moment.

            “No,” he uttered and he clenched his eyes shut even as she demanded his mouth, as her teeth nipped at his lip. He dragged himself away with willpower that he hadn’t even been aware he possessed. _Her_ willpower, no doubt, accessible to him when he needed it the most. “No-“

            She faltered in his arms, her hesitation becoming more pronounced. But he moved toward her quickly, attempting to ease her fears. He would not come unless she did first and he sensed that she was not far off. Just a little more-

            Pushing her down to the surface of his bed, he drove into her and then retreated, his breaths heavy in hunger. She arched along the bed, her breasts lifting into the air, and she felt that she was gorgeous to him, so very beautiful that he nearly climaxed right there as he merely gazed down at her. Biting down, he dropped his hands to either side of her waist, his eyes drifting upward to her pale nipples in the moonlight, his body shivering from the ache that he was holding back.

            She was going to kill him. Right here, she was going to kill him. And understanding his words through their bond, she couldn’t even feel guilty over it because he could do the same to her just as easily and just as quickly.

            He adjusted along her hips, trailing himself along her pelvis as he thrust into her. She was so wet that he slid in easily, his member dragging as he pulled out with a groan.

            She shifted beneath him, her hips lifting to rub against him as he plunged into her, meeting his hips. Her legs tightened around his waist and he grimaced as she urged him on, demanding each thrust from him until he trembled in her grasp. She felt the shivers from him, felt his hard body shake in her arms and she felt powerful then even though she was simultaneously coming apart beneath him. She had this power over him, could bring him to quake in her embrace and he was so beautiful in his fragility that she couldn’t hold herself together.

            Words left her lips thoughtlessly, her eyes squeezing shut as he rode her roughly, his hands on her threatening to bruise her from his desire.

            “Please. _Please-_ “

            He shook his head, a hard shake, as he moved deep inside of her. He bent to kiss her forcefully, his entire body shoving her across his bed as he thrust into her welcoming body. “The beach. The beach-“ he whispered mindlessly and his words broke off into a low moan, his eyes shut tightly.

            The beach. Yes. She would meet him there. She would wait for him, then. Now. Forever.

            She was throbbing below, fevered in his arms, and at the thought of the beach, at the thought of him coming to her at dusk, she was suddenly climaxing. Her body stiffened under his and his arm tightened around her and pulled her to his chest with enough force to frighten her. But then she was crying out against his ear, arching into his hard frame, and he whispered into her neck, bit down against the sensitive skin as she came apart wholly and senselessly. Waves of heat, of blinding light, took her over and she grabbed hold of him almost violently, fingernails digging into his smooth skin and latching on in anguish.

            He continued to drive into her, long deep thrusts that brought him against the very core of her and she was rising and falling at once, spinning.

            Above her, his breaths came heavily, his hard body thrusting into her almost wildly. She twisted in his arms, her fingers leaving his shoulders and trailing into his dark hair before taking hold of him firmly. Even sensitive below, she tightened around him as he drove deep into her and he dropped low, his shoulders trembling against her exquisitely.

            _“Rey-“_

            She lifted his head and kissed him deeply, refusing to let him leave even as he pulled out, as he withdrew from her. And with the one plunge back in, he stiffened. His breath hitched in her mouth, his entire body so rigid she was sure he would come apart if she touched him again. Then he was coming inside of her, his hips pushing into her and tightening, his arms crushing her to him. A low groan slid out of him, his body quivering in her arms and she dragged him in tightly, squeezing him below and with her embrace as well. His hips jerked against hers, slick with her wetness, and he grimaced, still thrusting into her rhythmically to ride out his release.

            She lifted her hips, welcoming him, sighing as the feel of him brought her to shiver almost helplessly. She would never be able to let him go, she realized then almost miserably, whimpering as he slid in and out of her unhurriedly, as he whispered words she couldn’t understand. She would never be able to let this feeling go, the feel of him and the desire for him.

            He slowed on top of her and finally came to a weary stop. His weight was perfect on her body, warm and comforting, and she trailed her fingers through his hair, nails digging into the nape of his neck.

            She loved him and she didn’t even know when it had happened. But here she was and she was scared and exhilarated all at once.

            He rose slightly off her frame and he pressed a kiss to her shoulder gently, breathing in the scent of her skin before turning his head to look down at her.

            She stared at him, returning his silent gaze as he searched her face, his skin damp with perspiration. Her heart raced, matching his, her chest pulsing with her heavy breaths.

            “Just tell me where and I will go there. I will find you,” he murmured to her firmly, his voice soft.

            And she realized in that moment that she was going to have to start anew; just as she had when she had left Jakku with Han Solo, as when she had taken the lightsaber to Luke. She would have to start again and this time she would not be able to turn back.

            He would have to do the same and as she stared at him she saw that he already knew it. Even as his breathing slowed, he was resolute, already planning. He would have to mask himself from Snoke and run, disappear one night and never return. Perhaps he could go with her back to the Resistance even if he had to finally face the penalties for his crimes. Face the people he had betrayed and take their punishment.

            Her hand slid across the surface of the bed to take hold of his tightly and as he met her gaze once more, she nodded.

            _I will be there with you. We’ll do it together. I won’t leave you._

            He returned her gesture wearily, settling.

            And she nodded again, with him now. “Yes. Yes,” she whispered and she rose off the bed to kiss him, her heart pounding in the silence between them.

 

**Preview:**

She turned at the water’s edge and raised her head to look over her shoulder. A cliff stood overhead and she could almost imagine herself there, standing beside the dark shadow that had still been Kylo Ren then.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I'm very close to the end of this fic, only two chapters left after this one and the last one is very short. But I want to keep writing this pairing. If anyone has any prompts for fics or one-shots, please send them my way. I have scenes in my head but none of them make sense or fit together and it's killing me. I need to write! So please send anything my way whether through comments or if you want to message me through tumblr. 
> 
> Thank you all and thank you guys especially for all your kind words. You guys make me ridiculously happy!


	11. Chapter Eleven

Chapter Eleven:

 

            She waited, her hair blowing in the breeze coming off the ocean, her skin rising into goose flesh. He would come, she knew he would. He had to. She had found a beach on a planet just off the Mid Rim, hidden amidst a formation of islands that had not yet been inhabited. She didn’t even know what they would encounter there, if there were dangerous animals the likes of which no one had ever seen living there. She just knew that she had searched for a beach at his request and she had sent him the coordinates and directions in a thought across the great expanse that was the galaxy. He had acknowledged her but that had been the extent of his communications and she had been uncertain then when he had pulled away to leave her reaching across a wide canyon of stillness.

            Did he regret promising what he had?

 

            When she had arrived in a TIE fighter, she had landed it on a cliff edge and had trekked down the brink and across miles of sand to a familiar beach. And she had known. All her calculations and her searching had paid off. This was the place. This was where she hoped she would meet him in the evening when he came to her in his shuttle.

            She turned at the water’s edge and raised her head to look over her shoulder. A cliff stood overhead and she could almost imagine herself there, standing beside the dark shadow that had still been Kylo Ren then. She smiled faintly, wearily. She wouldn’t know that anything had changed, that this was to be and would become truth, until he appeared.

            She turned in the afternoon sun and moved away from the water, heading for a small cave at the base of the cliff. It would afford her some cover for now, a place to wait for the next few hours. The breeze was particularly strong here and she recalled the way it had whipped the Knight’s overcoat, snapping his hood along his head. She could escape the brunt of it in the cave as she waited. She hoped she would only have to remain for a few hours.

 

            When the shuttle appeared, a pale green light through the cover of clouds in the darkening sky, she didn’t know if she could trust her vision. She raised her head, her eyes squinting as the shuttle descended through the clouds, whipping the sand and the surf under its power.

            It was him. He was here. He was _here_.

            She stood to her feet slowly, a hand lifting to block the sand from her face as the shuttle settled on the beach. And then the ramp along the belly of the shuttle had lowered to the sandy surface and he emerged in the light from within, a tall and dark silhouette striding down the ramp purposefully. He didn’t wear the helmet, his dark hair tossed in the strong wind, and as he hit the beach she couldn’t help herself. Her heart pounded at the very vision of him, her form trembling just to see him and the shout ripped from her throat painfully.

            _“Ben!”_

            His head snapped up at the sound of his long lost name and the deep frown on his face eased as she flew from the mouth of the cave toward him. Relief seemed to cross his face at seeing her form racing toward him, the tension leaving his shoulders. And then she was close enough that she hurled herself into his arms and never had someone held her as tight as he did then. She had seen this scene play out before, had witnessed it from the cliff edge overhead. But to be in his arms, physically in his embrace and not visiting him like a thief in the dead of night, was something entirely different. The wide span of his arms wrapped her up, a hand pressing her head into the crook of his neck and she breathed him in. The scent of metal and wood, of cedar, exactly right. She panted against his chest at the familiarity of him, at the utter relief, her arms circling his lean frame and holding on for dear life as she stopped herself from openly sobbing against him.

            “I’m here. I’m here,” he whispered against her hair as she trembled and his gloved hands lifted, taking hold of her face and turning her to look at him. He had to bend slightly to meet her teary gaze and his eyes were clear. “I’m here.”

            She shook her head at him frantically, feeling herself restrained slightly between his hands, her tears slipping down her face. “What are we doing here, Ben? What are we doing here?”

            His face softened at her question, the corner of his mouth quirking up. “We’re finishing what we started,” he replied and there was a light in his eyes then that she had never seen before. Her heart leapt in her chest, her lips parting. “We’re going to do what I said we were going to do in a dream, in one of your projections, whatever it was.” He gazed deep into her eyes, his hair curling around his face. “We’re going to be together.”

            Her heart broke into pieces at his words, her breath leaving her as if a giant weight had lifted from her. With an exhalation of relief, she smiled at him and he returned the gesture before bending his head to hers. His lips tasted as they had in the woods of Takodana, as they had in her visits with him when he had pressed them to hers. Only better.

            Perfect, in fact.

            His breath trembled against her cheek, his mouth hesitant as he kissed her once and then again, soft brushes. She gave herself up to him, her eyes sliding shut, her entire self practically singing as he shifted along her skin freely. “This is really happening.”

             He lifted his head from hers. “This is really happening,” he concurred quietly, his deep voice almost lost in the wind around them. “And I’m ready for whatever is waiting for me, whatever sentence I’m to be given.”

            She nodded slowly and she tilted her head, her brow furrowing as sadness coursed through her. Her hand came up to press to his face and he exhaled at her touch, his eyes drifting closed. “But not tonight,” she whispered.

            His eyes came open again in confusion.

            “Tonight is just for us,” she said adamantly and her gaze dropped to his lips.

            It took him a moment but he finally nodded in understanding. “Tonight is just for us,” he echoed faintly and this time when he kissed her, there was desire in his caress, the need that she recognized from her dreams, from her last visit to him.

            Underneath a brilliant moon peeking out behind clouds, he undressed and made a blanket of his dark uniform on the sand. And then he lowered her down to it as he had pressed her down to his bed in their shared dreams. He was as stunning in the moonlight as he had been in his bedroom, in her own quarters when she had called to him in the night. And she saw that he felt the same of her, that he saw her as beautiful in his arms, underneath him as he traced every part of her, as his mouth discovered her all over again.

            But her dreams had spoken lies.

            She had thought the feel of him in her arms had been overwhelming and he shattered the memories she knew, bringing her to climax easily under his fingers and mouth, forcing her to call out to the heavens, his real name on her lips as she came and fell only to rise again as he loved her.

            She worshipped him as well in the night, hearing his straining words on the wind as she brought him to peak and then started all over again, with the touch of her lips to his. Almost innocently. She memorized his true form in the darkness with the crash of the waters not too far off. Even as the cold surf reached them, she couldn’t part from him, moving across his lean body wantonly. His hands on her, the icy water washing over her leg, over his torso as he thrust deep into her from beneath, and his hands on her equal parts tender and fierce-

            Everything she thought she had known of his body had been a shadow of what he was. She trailed her hands over all of him, her lips following their path as he quaked under her caress, as he came apart at her touch and laid himself bare before her helplessly. She had thought that she could only wield her power in her dreams but here, under the bright moon, he was at her mercy and she was kind, her tongue running over his hardness and bringing him to the very edge of desire. She drank of him as he came, allowed him to touch her at her core as he recovered, as he urged her to her knees and then took her from behind. The world was somehow blinding in the dark as he entered her, as he ran his hands over her, reaching below to bring her to climax as he thrust deep.

            She would never know anything beyond him, she had realized dimly. She would never want to. She had been driven to come under his tongue and mouth, had tangled her hands in his hair and pulled, had tasted herself in his desperate kiss when he had risen across her body to meet her. He was hungry for her, devouring her, dipping his head down between her thighs yet again as the ripples of her climax had stilled. No one else would love her the way he did, could complete her as he did and she cried his name out again and again, almost whimpering when he lifted his mouth from her core and pulled her down to meet his eager thrust.

            She had seen everything that she was risking her life for in his eyes, had allowed him to see it in hers as he made love to her slowly, lazily. As his fingers slid across her throbbing center, as he lifted those fingers to his mouth to taste her there before leaning low to have her savor herself on his tongue. Every pulse of his hips had her yearning for more as if he had suddenly become a drug she couldn’t pull herself from, her entire body aching as his forceful thrusts threatened to tear her apart. She wanted him to use her up, for him to be spent on no one else except her, always.

            He had stilled at her thoughts, had held himself stiffly as her eyes had come open in a daze to meet his.

            “It’s only ever going to be you,” he had whispered and before she had been able to comprehend his words he had dragged her tight against his thrust, had trailed his hand along her body possessively as he had come inside her.  

            Yes. It would only ever be her.

 

**Preview:**

_You’re mine. You belong to me._

His heart gently picked up under her ear, pulsing faintly through his chest as a hand lifted to trail along her temple and then her cheek. As if he had heard her thoughts and had accepted them as truth.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's one more after this and it's incredibly short. But it's necessary to end it. Also, I started writing a new fic which I think will take me FOREVER to write. Still Reylo but kind of epic in scope for me and I'm a perfectionist so you might not hear from me for a bit as this fic is completed. Please don't be a stranger. I'm on tumblr, not too far away (the links are on my profile), fangirling and hurling myself into trash for Adam (Driver) and Daisy (Ridley, who stole her name from me, thankyouverymuch). I will try to update the last chapter in the next few days and hopefully my new (epic) fic will be accepted well as soon as I can post it. Thank you all so much. If I haven't reviewed the latest comments it's because they slipped by me and I apologize. But I appreciate absolutely every comment and polite criticism sent my way so thank you!


	12. Chapter Twelve/End

Epilogue:

 

            When the sun rose the next morning, it found them both wrapped in each other’s arms on the sand, the ragged ends of his overcoat flapping in the breeze underneath their figures.

            She came awake slowly, aware of his chest beneath her cheek. She loved it, she realized hazily. She adored waking up and finding him there, not having to reach for him in an empty bed. She closed her eyes and pushed her face further into him as if she could become one with him in that way.

            He made a small sound beneath her, low and languid, and his long arms dragged to pull her closer.

            She felt a small smile curl her lips as she went, as she nestled up against him.

            _You’re mine. You belong to me._

            His heart gently picked up under her ear, pulsing faintly through his chest as a hand lifted to trail along her temple and then her cheek. As if he had heard her thoughts and had accepted them as truth.

            The sun was brilliant, beautiful, rising over the waters. She didn’t even know the name of this island. But one day she would make sure to come back here, to bring him here to relive these fragile moments now, to burn them deep into memory for the rest of her life-

            “I love you.”

            Her breath left her, her eyes widening as they stared over the planes of his chest at the receding waters. For a long moment she couldn’t focus, couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t live.

            “I will always love you. No matter what happens now.”

            His faint words caused the tears to overflow from her eyes and she closed them tightly, her arms wrapping him up just as rigidly.

            _Yes. Yes,_ she nodded painfully against his chest, slowly falling apart at his words, as she understood. His arms tightened around her and his pulse calmed her as she cried softly into his chest.

            When they left the beach, they would face the world and the consequences his actions had garnered. But as she lifted her head along his side to meet his eyes, she told him silently that they were going to do it together.

            And he smiled down at her faintly, his face peaceful.

            _Then that’s all I need._

            And with that he kissed her softly, his hand gentle against her face, and he turned his head to look toward the rising sun.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this took so long and that it's so short but it needed to be by itself, I felt.
> 
> I finished and posted my very first Reylo fic and I would never have had such a blast doing it if not for all of you guys reading so thank you so much!! I'm working on another fic, a bigger one in scope but definitely Reylo. I'm really hoping it doesn't take too long but I can't make promises because I know how I get when I get dragged into epic fics so please bear with me! I would love for you guys to read that one as well when I finish and post it!
> 
> Until then, thanks again for reading! I appreciate every comment and kudo this fic received!


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